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/0C>0 



FURTHER FOOLISHNESS 



BY STEPHEN LEACOCK 



BEHIND THE BEYOND 

NONSENSE NOVELS 

LITERARY LAPSES 

SUNSHINE SKETCHES 

ARCADIAN 

ADVENTURES WITH 

THE IDLE RICH 

ESSAYS 

AND LITERARY 

STUDIES 

MOONBEAMS FROM 
THE LARGER LUNACY 



FURTHER 
FOOLISHNESS 

SKETCHES AND SATIRES 

ON THE FOLLIES OF THE DAY 

BY STEPHEN LEACOCK 

AUTHOR OF "nonsense NOVELS," "MOONBEAMS FROM 
THE LARGER LUNACY," "BEHIND THE BEYOND," ETC. 



NEW YORK: JOHN LANE COMPANY 
LONDON: JOHN LANE, THE BODLEY HEAD 
TORONTO: S. B. GUNDY : MCMXVI 







1> 



<b 






Copyright, 1916, 
By John Lane Company 




DEC -8 1916 



Press of 
J. J. Little & Ives Company 

New York, U.S.A. 



©GIA446744 



PREFACE 



Many years ago when I was a boy at school, we had 
over our class an ancient and spectacled schoolmaster 
who was as kind at heart as he was ferocious in appear- 
ance and whose memory has suggested to me the title 
of this book. 

It was his practice, on any outburst of gayety in the 
class room, to chase us to our seats with a bamboo cane 
and to shout at us in defiance, — 

Now, then, any further foolishness? 

I find by experience that there are quite a number of 
indulgent readers who are good enough to adopt the 
same expectant attitude towards me now. 



Stephen Leacock. 



McGill University, 
Montreal, 
Nov. I, 1916. y/ 



CONTENTS 



PAGE 

9 

II 

31 

66 



I Peace, War and Politics . 

1. Germany from Within Out 

2. Abdul Aziz Has His . 

3. In Merry Mexico 

4. Over the Grape Juice 

5. The White House from Without In 

11 Movies and Motors, Men and Women 

6. Madeline of the Movies . 

7. The Call of the Carbureter . . 

8. The Two Sexes, in Fives or Sixes 

9. The Grass' Bachelor's Guide 

10. Every Man and His Friends 

11. More than Twice Told Tales . 

12. A Study in Still Life .... 

III Follies in Fiction 

13. Stories Shorter Still .... 

14. The Snoopopaths .... 

15. Foreign Fiction in Imported Instalments 

IV Timid Thoughts on Timely Topics . . 

16. Are the Rich Happy? 283 

17. Humor as I See It 294 



94 
120 

131 
133 
151 
162 

174 

185 
197 
214 

221 
223 
231 
250 

281 



PEACE, WAR, AND 
POLITICS 



/. — Germany From Within Out 

THE adventure which I here narrate 
resulted out of a strange psychologi- 
cal experience of a kind that (out- 
side of Germany) would pass the 
bounds of comprehension. 

To begin with, I had fallen asleep. 
Of the reason for my falling asleep I 
have no doubt. I had remained awake nearly 
the whole of the preceding night, absorbed in 
the perusal of a number of recent magazine 
articles and books dealing with Germany as 
seen from within. I had read from cover to 
cover that charming book, just written by 
Lady de Washaway, under the title Ten Years 
as a Toady, or The Per-Hapsburgs as I Didn't 
Know Them. Her account of the life of the 
Imperial Family of Austria — simple, unaffect- 
ed, home-like: her picture of the good old 
Emperor, dining quietly off a cold potato and 
II 



Further Foolishness 



sitting after dinner playing softly to himself 
on the flute, while his attendants gently with- 
drew one by one from his presence : her de- 
scription of merry, boisterous, large-hearted 
Prince Stefan Karl, who kept the whole court 
in a perpetual roar all the time by asking such 
riddles as "When is a sailor not a sailor?" 
(the answer being, of course, when he is a 
German Prince) — in fact, the whole book had 
thrilled me to the verge of spiritual exhaus- 
tion. 

From Lady de Washaway's work I turned 
to peruse Hugo von Halbwitz's admirable 
book, Easy Marks, or How the German Gov- 
ernment Borrows Its Funds; and after that 
I had read Karl von Wiggleround's Despatches, 
and Barnstuff's Confidential Letters to Crim- 
minals. 

As a consequence I fell asleep as if poisoned. 

But the amazing thing is that, wherever it 
was or was not that I fell asleep, I woke up 
to find myself in Germany. 

I cannot offer any explanation as to how 
this came about. I merely state the fact. 

12 



Peace, War, and Politics 



There I was seated on the grassy bank of a 
country road. 

I knew It was Germany at once. There 
was no mistaking it. The whole landscape 
had an orderliness, a method about it that 
is, alas! never seen in British countries. The 
trees stood in neat lines, with the name of each 
nailed to it on a board. The birds sat in regu- 
lar rows, four to a branch, and sang in har- 
mony, very simply, but with the true German 
feeling. 

There were two peasants working beside 
the road. One was picking up fallen leaves, 
and putting them into neat packets of fifty. 
The other was cutting off the tops of the late 
thistles that still stood unwithered in the chill 
winter air, and arranging them according to 
size and colour. In Germany nothing Is lost; 
nothing is wasted. It is perhaps not generally 
known that from the top of the thistle the Ger- 
mans obtain picrate of ammonia, the most 
deadly explosive known to modern chemistry, 
while from the bulb below, butter, crude rub- 
13 



Further Foolishness 



ber and sweet cider are extracted In large 
quantities. 

The two peasants paused In their work a 
moment as they saw me glance towards them, 
and each, with the simple gentility of the Ger- 
man workingman, quietly stood on his head 
until I had finished looking at him. 

I felt quite certain, of course, that it must 
only be a matter of a short time before I would 
inevitably be arrested. 

I felt doubly certain of It when I saw a 
motor speeding towards me with a stout man, 
in military uniform and a Prussian helmet, 
seated behind the chauffeur. 

The motor stopped, but to my surprise, the 
military man, whom I perceived to be wearing 
the uniform of a general, jumped out and ad- 
vanced towards me with a genial cry of: 

"Well! Herr Professor!" 

I looked at him again 

"Why, Fritz !" I cried. 

"You recognise me?" he said. 

"Certainly," I answered, "you used to be 
14 



Peace, War, and Politics 



one of the six German waiters at McCluskey's 
restaurant in Toronto," 

The General laughed. 

"You really took us for waiters!" he said. 
"Well, well. My dear professor! How odd! 
We v/ere all generals in the German army. 
My own name is not Fritz Schmidt, as you 
knew it, but Count Boob von Boobenstein. The 
Boobs of Boobenstein," he added proudly, "are 
connected with the Hohenzollerns. When I 
am commanded to dine with the Emperor, I 
have the hereditary right to eat anything that 
he leaves." 

"But I don't understand!" I said. "Why 
were you in Toronto?" 

"Perfectly simple. Special military service. 
We were there to make a report. Each day 
we kept a record of the velocity and direction 
of the wind, the humidity of the air, the dis- 
tance across King street and the height of the 
C. P. R. Building. All this we wired to Ger- 
many every day." 

"For what purpose?" I asked. 

"Pardon me!" said the General, and then, 
15 



Further Foolishness 



turning the subject with exquisite tact: "Do 
you remember Max?" he said. 

"Do you mean the tall melancholy-looking 
waiter, who used to eat the spare oysters and 
drink up what was left in the glasses, behind 
the screen?" 

"Ha !" exclaimed my friend. "But why did 
he drink them? Why? Do you know that 
that man — his real name is not Max but Ernst 
Niedelfein' — is one of the greatest chemists in 
Germany? Do you realise that he was mak- 
ing a report to our War Office on the percent- 
age of alcohol obtainable in Toronto after 
closing time?" 

"And Karl?" I asked. 

"Karl was a topographist in the service of 
his High Serenity the King Regnant of Ba- 
varia" — here my friend saluted himself with 
both hands and blinked his eyes four times — 
"He made maps of all the breweries of Can- 
ada. We know now to a bottle how many 
German soldiers could be used in invading 
Canada without danger of death from 
drought." 

i6 



Peace, War, and Politics 



"How many was it?" I asked. 

Boobenstein shook his head. 

"Very disappointing," he said, f'ln fact 
your country is not yet ripe for German occu- 
pation. Our experts say that the invasion of 
Canada is an impossibility unless we use Mil- 
waukee as a base " 

"But step into my motor," said the Count, 
interrupting himself, "and come along with 
me. Stop, you are cold. This morning air is 
very keen. Take this," he added, picking off 
the fur cap from the chauffeur's head; "it will 
be better than that hat you are wearing — or, 
here, wait a moment " 

As he spoke the Count unwound a woollen 
muffler from the chauffeur's neck, and placed 
it round mine. 

"Now then," he added, "this sheepskin 
coat " 

"My dear Count," I protested. 

"Not a bit, not a bit," he cried, as he pulled 
off the chauffeur's coat and shoved me mto it. 
His face beamed with true German generos- 
ity. 

17 



Further Foolishness 



"Now," he said, as we settled back into the 
motor and started along the road, **I am en- 
tirely at your service. Try one of these cigars ! 
Got it alight? Right! You notice, no doubt, 
the exquisite flavour. It is a Tannhduser. Our 
chemists are making these cigars now out of 
the refuse of the tanneries and glue factories." 

I sighed involuntarily. Imagine trying to 
"blockade" a people who could make cigars 
out of refuse ; imagine trying to get near them 
at all! 

"Strong, aren't they," said von Boobenstein, 
blowing a big puff of smoke. "In fact, it Is 
these cigars that have given rise to the legend 
(a pure fiction, I need hardly say) that our 
armies are using asphyxiating gas. The truth 
is they are merely smoking German-made to- 
bacco in their trenches." 

"But come now," he continued, "your meet- 
ing with me is most fortunate. Let me ex- 
plain. I am at present on the Intelligence 
Branch of the General Staff. My particular 
employment Is dealing with foreign visitors — 
the branch of our service called, for short, the 
i8 



Peace, War, and Politics 



Eingewanderte-Fremden-Verfullungs- Bureau. 
How would you call that?" 

"It sounds," I said, "like the Bureau for 
Stuffing Up Incidental Foreigners." 

"Precisely," said the Count, "though your 
language lacks the music of ours. It is my 
business to escort visitors round Germany and 
help them with their despatches. I took the 
Ford party through — in a closed cattle-car, 
with the lights out. They were greatly im- 
pressed. They said that though they saw noth- 
ing, they got an excellent idea of the atmosphere 
of Germany. It was I who introduced Lady 
de Washaway to the Court of Franz Joseph. 
I write the despatches from Karl von Wiggle- 
round, and send the necessary material to 
Ambassador von Barnstuff. In fact I can take 
you everywhere, show you everything, and" — 
here my companion's military manner suddenly 
seemed to change into something obsequiously 
and strangely familiar — "it won't cost you a 
cent — not a cent, unless you care " 

I understood. 

I handed him ten cents. 
19 



Further Foolishness 



"Thank you, sir," he said. Then with an 
abrupt change back to his military manner: 

"Now, then, what would you like to see? 
The army? The breweries? The Royal court? 
Berlin? What shall it be? My time is lim- 
ited, but I shall be delighted to put myself at 
your service for the rest of the day." 

"I think," I said, "I should like more than 
anything to see Berlin, if it is possible." 

"Possible?" answered my companion. 
"Nothing easier." 

The motor flew ahead and in a few moments 
later we were making our arrangements with a 
local station master for a special train to Ber- 
lin. 

I got here my first glimpse of the wonder- 
ful perfection of the German railway system. 

"I am afraid," said the station master, with 
deep apologies, "that I must ask you to wait 
half an hour. I am moving a quarter of a 
million troops from the east to the west front, 
and this always holds up the traffic for fifteen 
or twenty minutes." 

I stood on the platform watching the troop 

20 



Peace, War, and Politics 



trains go by and admiring the marvellous In- 
genuity of the German system. 

As each train went past at full speed, a pos- 
tal train (Feld-Post-Eisenbahn-Zug) moved on 
the other track in the opposite direction, from 
which a shower of letters were thrown in to 
the soldiers through the window. Immediately 
after the postal train, a soup train (Soup-Zug) 
was drawn along, from the windows of which 
soup was squirted out of a hose. 

Following this there came at full speed a 
beer train (Bier-Zug) from which beer bombs 
were exploded in all directions. 

I watched till all had passed. 

"Now," said the station master, "your train 
is ready. Here you are." 

Away we sped through meadows and fields, 
hills and valleys, forests and plains. 

And nowhere — I am forced, like all other 
travellers, to admit it — did we see any signs 
of the existence of war. Everything was quiet, 
orderly, usual. We saw peasants digging — in 
an orderly way^for acorns in the frozen 
ground. We saw little groups of soldiers drill- 

21 



Further Foolishness 



ing in the open squares of villages — in their 
quiet German fashion — each man chained by 
the leg to the man next to him ; here and there 
great Zeppelins sailed overhead dropping 
bombs, for practice, on the less important 
towns; at times in the village squares we saw 
clusters of haggard women (quite quiet and 
orderly) waving little red flags and calling: 
"Bread, Bread!" 

But nowhere any signs of war. Certainly 
not. 

We reached Berlin just at nightfall. I had 
expected to find it changed. To my surprise 
it appeared just as usual. The streets were 
brilliantly lighted. Music burst in waves from 
the restaurants. From the theatre-signs I saw, 
to my surprise, that they were playing Hamlet, 
East Lynne and Potash and Perlmutter. Ev- 
erywhere were brightness, gaiety and light- 
heartedness. 

Here and there a merry-looking fellow with 
a brush and a pail of paste and a roll of pa- 
pers over his arm would swab up a casualty 

22 



Peace, War, and Politics 



list of two or three thousand names, amid roads 
of good-natured laughter. 

What perplexed me most was the sight of 
thousands upon thousands of men, not in 
uniform, but in ordinary civilian dress. 

"Boobenstein," I said, as we walked down 
the Linden Avenue, "I don't understand it." 

"The men?" he answered. "It's a perfectly 
simple matter. I see you don't understand our 
army statistics. At the beginning of the war 
we had an army of three million. Very good. 
Of these, one million were in the reserve. We 
called them to the colours, that made four 
million. Then of these all who wished were 
allowed to volunteer for special services. Half 
a million did so. That made four and a half 
million. In the first year of the war we suf- 
fered two million casualties, but of these sev- 
enty-five per cent., or one and a half million, 
returned later on to the colours, bringing our 
grand total up to six million. This six mil- 
lion we use on each of six fronts, giving a 
grand total of thirty-six million." 

"I see," I said. "In fact, I have seen these 
23 



Further Foolishness 



figures before. In other words, your men are 
Inexhaustible." 

"Precisely," said the Count, "and mark you, 
behind these we still have the Landsturm, made 
up of men between fifty-five and sixty, and the 
Landslide, reputed to be the most terrible of 
all the German levies, made up by withdraw- 
ing the men from the breweries. That Is the 
last final act of national fury. But come," he 
said, "you must be hungry. Is it not so?" 

"I am," I admitted, "but I had hesitated to 
acknowledge It. I feared that the food sup- 
ply. " 

Von Boobenstein broke Into hearty laugh- 
ter 

"Food supply!" he roared, "My dear fel- 
low, you must have been reading the English 
newspapers! Food supply! My dear profes- 
sor! Have you not heard? We have got over 
that difficulty entirely and forever. But come, 
here Is a restaurant. In with you and eat to 
your heart's content." 

We entered the restaurant. It was filled to 
overflowing with a laughing crowd of diners 
24 



Peace, War, and Politics 



and merry-makers. Thick clouds of blue cigar- 
smoke filled the air. Waiters ran to and fro 
with tall steins of foaming beer, and great bun- 
dles of bread tickets, soup tickets, meat cards 
and butter coupons. 

These were handed around to the guests, 
who sat quietly chewing the corners of them as 
they sipped their beer. 

"Now then," said my host, looking over the 
printed menu in front of him, "what shall it 
be? What do you say to a ham certificate with 
a cabbage ticket on the side? Or how would 
you like lobster-coupon with a receipt for as- 
paragus?" 

"Yes," I answered, "or perhaps as our jour- 
ney has made me hungry, one of these beef 
certificates with an aflidavit for Yorkshire pud- 
ding." 

"Done!" said Boobenstein. 

A few moments later we were comfortably 
drinking our tall glasses of beer and smoking 
Tannhauser cigars, with an appetising pile of 
coloured tickets and certificates in front of us. 

"Admit," said von Boobenstein, good na- 
25 



Further Foolishness 



turedly, "that we have overcome the food dif- 
ficulty forever." 

"You have," I said. 

"It was a pure matter of science and effi- 
ciency," he went on. "It has long been ob- 
served that if one sat down in a restaurant and 
drank beer and smoked cigars (especially such 
a brand as these Tannhdusers) during the 
time it took for the food to be brought (by a 
German waiter), all appetite was gone. It 
remained for the German scientists to organ- 
ise this into system. Have you finished? Or 
would you like to take another look at your 
beef certificate?" 

We rose. Von Boobenstein paid the bill by 
writing I.O.U. on the back of one of the cards 
— not forgetting the waiter, for whom he 
wrote on a piece of paper, ^"God bless you" — 
and we left. 

"Count," I said, as we took our seat on a 
bench in the Sieges-Allee, or Allee of Victory, 
and listened to the music of a military band, 
and watched the crowd, "I begin to see that 
Germany is unconquerable." 
26 



Peace, War, and Politics 



"Absolutely so," he answered. 

"In the first place, your men are Inexhaust- 
ible. If we kill one class, you call out an- 
other; and anyway one-half of those we kill 
get well again, and the net result is that you 
have more than ever." 

"Precisely," said the Count. 

"As to food," I continued, "you are abso- 
lutely invulnerable. What with acorns, this- 
tles, tanbark, glue, tickets, coupons, and cer- 
tificates, you can go on forever." 

"We can," he said. 

"Then for money, you use I. O. U.'s. Any- 
body with a leadpencil can command all the 
funds he wants. Moreover, your soldiers at 
the front are getting dug in deeper and deep- 
er: last spring they were fifty feet under 
ground: by 191 8 they will be nearly 200 feet 
down. Short of mining for them, we shall 
never get them out." 

"Never," said Von Boobenstein with great 
firmness. 

"But there is one thing that I don't quite 
understand. Your navy, your ships. There, 
27 



Further Foolishness 



surely, we have you : sooner or later that whole 
proud fleet in the Kiel Canal will come out un- 
der fire of our guns and be sunk to the bottom 
of the sea. There, at least, we conquer." 

Von Boobenstein broke into loud laughter. 

"The fleet!" he roared, and his voice was 
almost hysterical and overstrung, as if high 
living on lobster-coupons and over-smoking of 
Tannhdiisers was undermining his nerves. 
"The fleet! Is it possible you do not know? 
Why all Germany knows it. Capture our fleet ! 
Ha ! Ha ! It now lies fifty miles inland. We 
have filled in the canal — pushed in the banks. 
The canal is solid land again, and the fleet is 
high and dry. The ships are boarded over 
and painted to look like German inns and brew- 
eries. Prinz Adelbert is disguised as a brewer; 
Admiral von Tirpitz is made up as a head 
waiter; Prince Heinrich is a bartender; the 
sailors are dressed up as chambermaids. And 
some day when Jellicoe and his men are coaxed 
ashore, they will drop in to drink a glass of 
beer, and then — pouf! we will explode them 
all with a single torpedo! Such is the naval 
28 



Peace, War, and Politics 



strategy of our scientists! Are we not a na- 
tion of sailors?" 

Von Boobenstein's manner had grown still 
wilder and more hysterical. There was a queer 
glitter in his eyes. 

I thought it better to soothe him. 

"I see," I said, "the Allies are beaten. One 
might as well spin a coin for heads or tails to 
see whether we abandon England now or wait 
till you come and take it." 

As I spoke, I took from my pocket an Eng- 
lish sovereign that I carry as a lucky-piece, and 
prepared to spin it in the air. 

Von Boobenstein, as he saw it, broke into a 
sort of hoarse shriek. 

"Gold! gold!" he cried. "Give it to me!" 

"What?" I exclaimed. 

"A piece of gold," he panted. "Give it to 
me, give it to me, quick. I know a place where 
we can buy bread with it. Real bread — not 
tickets — food — give me the gold — gold — for 
bread — we can get bread. I am starving — gold 
— bread." 

And as he spoke his hoarse voice seemed 
29 



Furtlier Foolishness 



to grow louder and louder in my ears — the 
sounds of the street were hushed — a sudden 
darkness fell — and a wind swept among the 
trees of the Allee of Victory — moaning — and 
a thousand, a myriad voices seemed to my car 
to take up the cry — 

"Gold! Bread! We are starving." 

Then I woke up. 



30 



//. — Abdul Aziz Has His 
An Adventure in the Yildiz Kiosk 

COME, come, Abdul," I said, putting 
my hand, not unkindly, on his shoul- 
der. "Tell me all about it." 

But he only broke out into renewed 
sobbing. 

"There, there," I continued, soothingly. 
"Don't cry, Abdul. Look! Here's a lovely 
narghileh for you to smoke, with a gold mouth- 
piece. See ! Wouldn't you like a little latakia, 
eh? And here's a little toy Armenian — look! 
See his head come off — snick! There, it's on 
again, snick! now it's off! look, Abdul!" 
But still he sobbed. 

His fez had fallen over his ears and his 
face was all smudged with tears. 
It seemed impossible to stop him. 
I looked about in vain from the little alcove 
of the hall of the Yildiz Kiosk where we were 
31 



Further Foolishness 



sitting on a Persian bench under a lemon tree. 
There was no one in sight. I hardly knew 
what to do. 

In the Yildiz Kiosk — I think that was the 
name of the place — I scarcely as yet knew my 
way about. In fact, I had only been in it a 
few hours. I had come there — as I should have 
explained in commencing — in order to try to 
pick up information as to the exact condition 
of things in Turkey. For this purpose I had 
assumed the character and disguise of an Eng- 
lish governess. I had long since remarked that 
an English governess is able to go anywhere, 
see everything, penetrate the interior of any 
royal palace and move to and fro as she pleases 
without hindrance and without insult. No bar- 
rier can stop her. Every royal court, however 
splendid or however exclusive, is glad to get 
her. She dines with the King or the Emperor 
as a matter of course. All state secrets are 
freely confided to her and all military plans 
are submitted to her judgment. Then after a 
three weeks' residence, she leaves the court 
and writes a book of disclosures. 
32 



Peace, War, and Politics 



This was now my plan. 

And up to the moment of which I speak, it 
had worked perfectly. 

I had found my way through Turkey to the 
royal capital without difficulty. The poke 
bonnet, the spectacles and the long black dress 
which I had assumed had proved an ample pro- 
tection. None of the rude Turkish soldiers 
among whom I had passed had offered to lay 
a hand on me. This tribute I am compelled 
to pay to the splendid morality of the Turks. 
They wouldn't touch me. 

Access to the Yildiz Kiosk and to the Sultan 
had proved equally easy. I had merely to ob- 
tain an interview with Codfish Pasha, the Sec- 
retary of War, whom I found a charming man 
of great intelligence, a master of three or four 
languages (as he himself informed me), and 
able to count up to seventeen. 

"You wish," he said, "to be appointed as 
English, or rather Canadian governess to the 
Sultan?" 

"Yes," I answered. 

"And your object?" 
33 



Further Foolishness 



"I propose to write a book of disclosures." 

"Excellent," said Codfish. 

An hour later I found myself, as I have said, 
in a flagstoned hall of the Yildiz Kiosk, with 
the task of amusing and entertaining the Sul- 
tan. 

Of the difficulty of this task I had formed no 
conception. Here I was at the outset, with the 
unhappy Abdul bent and broken with sobs 
which I found no power to check or control. 

Naturally, therefore, I found myself at a 
loss. The little man as he sat on his cushions, 
in his queer costume and his long slippers; 
with his fez fallen over his lemon-coloured 
face, presented such a pathetic object that I 
could not find the heart to be stern with him. 

"Come, now, Abdul," I said, "be good!" 

He paused a moment in his crying — 

"Why do you call me Abdul?" he asked. 
"That isn't my name." 

"Isn't it?" I said. "I thought all you Sul- 
tans were called Abdul. Isn't the Sultan's 
name always Abdul?" 

"Mine isn't," he whimpered, "but it doesn't 
34 



Peace, War, and Politics 



matter," and his face began to crinkle up with 
renewed weeping. "Call me anything you 
like. It doesn't matter. Anyway I'd rather 
be called Abdul than be called a W-W-War 
Lord and a G-G-General when they won't let 
me have any say at all " 

And with that the little Sultan burst into un- 
restrained crying. 

"Abdul," I said firmly, "if you don't stop 
crying, I'll go and fetch one of the Bashi Ba- 
zooks to take you away." 

The little Sultan found his voice again. 
"There aren't any Bub-Bub-Bashi Bazooks 
left," he sobbed. 

"None left?" I exclaimed. "Where are they 
gone?" 

"They've t-t-taken them all aw-w-way " 

"Who have?" 



"The G-G-G-Germans," sobbed Abdul. 
"And they've sent them all to P-P-P-Poland." 

"Come, come, Abdul," I said, straightening 
him up a little as he sat. "Brace up! Be a 
Turk! Be a Mohammedan! Don't act like 
a Christian." 

35 



Further Foolishness 



This seemed to touch his pride. He made a 
^reat effort to be calm. I could hear him mut- 
tering to himself, "Allah, lUallah, Mohammed 
rasoul Allah !" He said this over a good many 
times, while I took advantage of the pause to 
get his fez a little straighter and wipe his face. 

"How many times have I said it?" he asked 
presently. 

"Twenty." 

"Twenty? That ought to be enough, 
shouldn't it?" said the Sultan, regaining him- 
self a little. "Isn't prayer helpful, eh? Give 
me a smoke?" 

I filled his narghileh for him, and he began 
to suck blue smoke out of it with a certain con- 
tentment, while the rose water bubbled in the 
bowl below. 

"Now, Abdul," I said, as I straightened up 
his cushions and made him a little more com- 
fortable, "what is it? What is the matter?" 

"Why," he answered, ''they've all 
g-g-gone " 

"Now, don't cry! Tell me properly." 
36 



Peace, War, and Politics 



"They've all gone b-b-back on me ! Boo I 
Hoo!" 

"Who have? Who've gone back en you?" 

"Why, everybody. The English and the 
French and everybody " 

"What do you mean?" I asked with increas- 
ing interest. "Tell me exactly what you mean. 
Whatever you say I will hold sacred, of 
course." 

I saw my way already to a volume of in- 
teresting disclosures. 

"They used to treat me so differently," Ab- 
dul went on, and his sobbing ceased as he con- 
tinued — "They used to call me the Bully Boy 
of the Bosphorus. They said I was the Guar- 
dian of the Golden Gate. They used to let me 
kill all the Armenians I liked and nobody was 
allowed to collect debts from me and every 
now and then they used to send me the nicest 
ultimatums — Oh! you don't know," he broke 
off, "how nice it used to be here in the Yildiz 
in the old days ! We used all to sit round here, 
in this very hall, me and the diplomats — and 
play games, such as 'Ultimatum, ultimatum, 
37 



Further Foolishness 



who's got the ultimatum?' — Oh, say, it was so 
nice and peaceful ! And we used to have big 
dinners and conferences, especially after the 
military manoeuvres and the autumn massacres 
— me and the diplomats, all with stars and 
orders, and me in my white fez with a copper 
tassel — and hold discussions about how to re- 
form Macedonia." 

"But you spoilt It all, Abdul," I protested. 

"I didn't, I didn't!" he exclaimed almost 
angrily. 

"I'd have gone on for ever. It was all so 
nice. They used to present me — the diplomats 
did — with what they called their Minimum, 
and then we (I mean Codfish Pasha and me) 
had to draft In return our Maximum — see? — 
and then we all had to get together again and 
frame a status quo^ 

"But that couldn't go on for ever," I urged. 

"Why not?" said Abdul. "It was a great 

system. We Invented It, but everybody was 

beginning to copy It. In fact, we were leading 

the world, before all this trouble came. Didn't 

38 



Peace, War, and Politics 



you have anything of our system in your coun- 
try — what do you call it — in Canada?" 

"Yes," I admitted; "now that I come to 
think of it, we were getting into it. But the 
war has changed it all " 

"Exactly," said Abdul. "There you are! 
All changed! The good old days gone for- 
ever!" 

"But surely," I said, "you still have friends 
— the Bulgarians." 

The Sultan's little black eyes flashed with 
anger as he withdrew his pipe for a moment 
from his mouth. 

"The low scoundrels!" he said between his 
teeth. "The traitors!" 

"Why, they're your Allies!" 

"Yes, Allah destroy them! They are. 
They've come over to our side. After cen- 
turies of fighting they refuse to play fair any 
longer. They're on our side! Who ever 
heard of such a thing? Bah! But, of course," 
he added more quietly, "we shall massacre 
them just the same. We shall insist, in the 
terms of peace, on retaining our rights of 
39 



Further Foolishness 



massacre. But then, no doubt, all the nations 
will." 

"But you have the Germans " I began. 

"Hush, hush," said Abdul, laying his hand 
on my arm. "Some one might hear." 

"You have the Germans," I repeated. 

"The Germans," said Abdul, and his voice 
sounded in a queer sing-song like that of a 
child repeating a lesson, "The Germans are 
my noble friends, the Germans are my power- 
ful allies, the Kaiser is my good brother, the 
Reichstag is my foster sister: I love the Ger- 
mans: I hate the English: I love the Kaiser: 
the Kaiser loves me " 

"Stop, stop, Abdul," I said, "who taught 
you all that?" 

Abdul looked cautiously around. 

''''They did," he said in a whisper. "There's 
a lot more of it. Would you like me to 
recite some more? Or, no, no, what's the 
good? I've no heart for reciting any longer." 
And at this Abdul fell to weeping again. 

"But Abdul," I said, "I don't understand. 
Why are you so distressed just now? All this 
40 



Peace, War, and Politics 



has been going on for over two years. Why 
are you so worried just now?" 

"Oh," exclaimed the little Sultan in surprise, 
"you haven't heard! I see — you've only just 
arrived. Why, to-day is the last day. After 
to-day it is all over." 

"Last day for what?" I asked. 

"For intervention. For the intervention of 
the United States. The only thing that can 
save us. It was to have come to-day, by the 
end of this full moon — our astrologers had 
predicted it — Smith Pasha, Minister under 
Heaven of the United States, had promised, 
if it came, to send it to us at the earliest mo- 
ment. How do they send it, do you know, in 
a box, or in a paper?" 

"Stop," I said as my ear caught the sound 
of footsteps. "There's some one coming 
now." 

The sound of slippered feet was distinctly 
heard on the stones in the outer corridor. 

Abdul listened intently a moment. 

"I know his slippers," he said. 

"Who is it?" * 

41 



Further Foolishness 



"It Is my chief secretary, Toomuch KoflGl. 
Yes, here he comes." 

As the Sultan spoke the doors swimg open 
and there entered an aged Turk, in a flowing 
gown and coloured turban, with a melancholy 
yellow face, and a long white beard that swept 
to his girdle. 

"Who do you say he Is?" I whispered to 
Abdul. 

"My chief secretary," he whispered back. 
"Toomuch Koffi." 

"He looks like it," I murmured. 

Meantime, Toomuch Koffi had advanced 
across the broad flagstones of the hall where 
we were sitting. With hands lifted he salaamed 
four times — east, west, north, and south. 

"What does that mean?" I whispered. 

"It means," said the Sultan, with visible agi- 
tation, "that he has a communication of the 
greatest Importance and urgency, which will 
not brook a moment's delay." 

"Well, then, why doesn't he get a move on?'* 
I whispered. 

"Hush," said Abdul. 
42 



Peace, War, and Politics 



Toomuch Koffi now straightened himself 
from his last salaam and spoke. 

"Allah is great!" he said. 

"And Mohammed is his prophet," rejoined 
the Sultan. 

"Allah protect you ! And make your face 
shine," said Toomuch. 

"Allah lengthen your beard," said the Sul- 
tan, and he added aside to me in English, which 
Toomuch Koffi evidently did not understand, 
"I'm all eagerness to know what it is — it's 
something big, for sure" — the little man was 
quite quivering with excitement, as he spoke. 
"Do you know what I think it is? I think it 
must be the American Intervention. The 
United States Is going to Intervene. Eh? 
What? Don't you think so?" 

"Then hurry him up," I urged. 

"I can't," said Abdul. "It Is Impossible In 
Turkey to do business like that. He must have 
some coffee first and then he must pray and 
then there must be an interchange of pres- 
ents." 

43 



Further Foolishness 



I groaned, for I was getting as impatient as 
Abdiil himself. 

"Do you not do public business like that in 
Canada?" the Sultan continued. 

"We used to. But we have got over it," I 
said. 

Meantime a slippered attendant had entered 
and placed a cushion for the secretary, and 
In front of it a little Persian stool on which he 
put a quaint cup filled with coffee black as ink. 

A similar cup was placed before the Sultan. 

"Drink!" said Abdul. 

"Not first, until the lips of the Commander 
of the Faithful " 

"He means 'after you,' " I said. "Hurry 
up, Abdul." 

Abdul took a sip. "Allah is good," he said.. 

"And all things are of Allah," rejoined Too- 
much. 

Abdul unpinned a glittering jewel from his 
robe and threw it to the feet of Toomuch. 
"Take this poor bauble," he said. 

Toomuch Koflfi in return took from his wrist 
a solid bangle of beaten gold. "Accept this 
44 



Peace, War, and Politics 



mean gift from your humble servant," he said. 

"Right!" said Abdul, speaking in a changed 
voice as the ceremonies ended. "Now, then, 
Toomuch, what is it? Hurry up. Be quick. 
What is the matter?" 

Toomuch rose to his feet, lifted his hands 
high in the air with the palms facing the Sul- 
tan. 

"One is without," he said. 

"Without what?" I asked eagerly of the 
Sultan. 

"Without — outside. Don't you understand 
Turkish? What you call in English — A gen- 
tleman to see me." 

"And did he make all that fuss and delay 
over that?" I asked in disgust. "Why with 
us in Canada, at one of the public departments 
at Ottawa, all that one would have to do would 
be simply to send in a card, get it certified, then 
simply wait in an anteroom, simply read a 
newspaper, send in another card, wait a little, 
then simply send in a third card, and then sim- 
ply " 

"Pshaw!" said Abdul, "the cards might be 
45 



Further Foolishness 



poisoned. Our system is best. Speak on, 
Toomuch. Who is without? Is it perchance 
a messenger from Smith Pasha, Minister un- 
der Heaven of the United States?" 

"Alas, no!" said Toomuch. "It is HE. It 
is THE LARGE ONE!" 

As he spoke he rolled his eyes upward with 
a gesture of despair. 

"HE!" cried Abdul, and a look of terror 
convulsed his face. "The Large One! Shut 
him out! Call the Chief Eunuch and the Ma- 
jor Domo of the Harem! Let him not in!" 

"Alas," said Toomuch. "He threw them 
out of the window. Lo ! he is here; he enters." 

As the Secretary spoke a double door at the 
end of the hall swung noisily open, at the blow 
of an imperious fist, and with a rattle of arms 
and accoutrements a man of gigantic stature, 
wearing full military uniform and a spiked hel- 
met, strode into the room. 

As he entered, an attendant who accom- 
panied him, also in a uniform and a spiked hel- 
met, called in a loud strident voice that re- 
sounded to the arches of the hall. 
46 



Peace, War, and Politics 



"His High Excellenz Feld Marechal von 
der Doppelbauch, Spezial Representant of His 
Majestat William II, Deutscher Kaiser and 
King of England!" 

Abdul collapsed into a little heap. His fez 
fell over his face. Toomuch Koffi had slunk 
into a corner. 

Von der Doppelbauch strode noisily for- 
ward and came to a stand in front of Abdul 
with a click and rattle after the Prussian fash- 
ion. 

"Majestat," he said in a deep, thunderous 
voice, "I greet you. I bow low before you. 
Salaam! I kiss the floor at your feet." 

But in reality he did nothing of the sort. He 
stood to the full height of his six feet six and 
glowered about him. 

"Salaam!" said Abdul, in a feeble voice. 

"But who is this?" added the Field Marshal, 
looking angrily at me. My costume, or rather 
my disguise, for, as I have said, I was wearing 
a poke bonnet with a plain black dress, seemed 
to puzzle him. 

47 



Further Foolishness 



"My new governess," said Abdul. "She came 
this morning. She is a professor " 

"Bah!" said the Field Marshal, "a woman 
3, professor! Bah!" 

"No, no," said Abdul in protest, and it 
seemed decent of the little creature to stick up 
for me — "She's all right, she is interesting and 
knows a great deal. She's from Canada!" 

"What!" exclaimed Von der Doppelbauch. 
"From Canada! But stop! It seems to me 
that Canada is a country that we are at war 
with. Let me think, Canada? I must look at 
my list" — he pulled out a little set of tablets 
as he spoke — "let me see — Britain, Great 
Britain, British North America, British Guiana, 
British Nigeria — ha! of course, under K — 
Kandahar, Korfu — no, I don't seem to see it 
— Fritz!" he called to the aide de camp who 
had announced him — "telegraph at once to the 
Topographical Staff at Berlin and find out if 
we are at war with Canada. If we are" — he 
pointed at me — "throw her into the Bosphorus. 
If we are not, treat her with every considera- 
tion, with every distinguished consideration. 
48 



Peace, War, and Politics 



But see that she doesn't get away. Keep her 
tight, till we are at war with Canada, as no 
doubt we shall be, wherever it is, and then 
throw her into the Bosphorus." 

The aide clicked his heels and withdrew. 

"And now, your majesty," continued the 
Field Marshal, turning abruptly to the Sultan, 
"I bring you good news." 

"More good news," groaned Abdul miser- 
ably, winding his clasped fingers to and fro. 
"Alas! good news again!" 

"First," said Von der Doppelbauch, "the 
Kaiser has raised you to the order of the Black 
Duck. Here is your feather." 

"Another feather," moaned Abdul. "Here, 
Toomuch, take it and put it among the feath- 
ers!" 

"Secondly," went on the Field Marshal, 
checking off his items as he spoke, "your con- 
tribution, your personal contribution to His 
Majesty's Twenty-third Imperial Loan is ac- 
cepted." 

"I didn't make any!" sobbed Abdul. 

"No difference," said Von der Doppelbauch. 
49 



Further Foolishness 



"It is accepted anyway. The telegram has 
just arrived accepting all your money. My 
assistants are packing it up outside." 

Abdul collapsed still further into his cush- 
ions. 

"Third, and this will rejoice your Majesty's 
heart: Your troops are again victorious!" 

"Victorious!" moaned Abdul. "Victorious 
again ! I knew they would be ! I suppose they 
are all dead as usual?" 

"They are," said the Marshal. "Their 
souls," he added reverently, with a military 
salute, "are in Heaven!" 

"No, no," gasped Abdul, "not in Heaven! 
Don't say that ! Not in Heaven ! Say that they 
are in Nishvana, our Turkish paradise?" 

"I am sorry," said the Field Marshal grave- 
ly. "This is a Christian war. The Kaiser has 
insisted on their going to Heaven." 

The Sultan bowed his head. "Ishmillahl'* 
he murmured. "It is the will of Allah. "^ 

"But they did not die without glory," went 
on the Field Marshal. "Their victory was 
complete. Set it out to yourself," and here his 
50 



Peace, War, and Politics 



eyes glittered with soldierly passion — "There 
stood your troops — ten thousand! In front 
of them the Russians — a hundred thousand. 
What did your men do ? Did they pause ? No, 
they charged 1" 

"They charged^ cried the Sultan in misery. 
"Don't say that! Have they charged again! 
Just Allah!" he added, turning to Toomuch. 
"They have charged again ! And we must pay, 
we shall have to pay — we always do when they 
charge. Alas, alas, they have charged again. 
Everything is charged!" 

"But how nobly," rejoined the Prussian. 
"Imagine it to yourself! Here, beside this 
stool, let us say, were your men. There, across 
the cushion, were the Russians. All the ground 
between was mined. We knew it. Our soldiers 
knew it. Even our staff knew it. Even Prinz 
Rattelwitz Halfstuff, our commander, knew it. 
But your soldiers did not. What did our 
Prinz do? The Prinz called for volunteers 
to charge over the ground. There was a great 
shout — from our men, our German regiments. 
He called again. There was another shout. 
51 



Further Foolishness 



He called still again. There was a third shout. 
Think of it ! And again Prinz Half stuff called 
and again they shouted." 

"Who shouted?" asked the Sultan gloomily. 

"Our men, our Germans." 

"Did my Turks shout?" asked Abdul. 

"They did not. They were too busy tighten- 
ing their belts and fixing cheir bayonets. But 
our generous fellows shouted for them. Then 
Prinz Halfstuff called out 'The place of honour 
is for our Turkish brothers. Let them charge !' 
And all our men shouted again." 

"And they charged?" 

"They did — and were all gloriously blown 
up. A magnificent victory. The blowing up 
of the mines blocked all the ground, checked 
the Russians and enabled our men — by a pre- 
arranged rush — to advance backwards — tak- 
ing up a new strategic " 

"Yes, yes," said Abdul, "I know — I have 
read of it, alas ! only too often. And they are 
dead! Toomuch," he added quietly, drawing a 
little pouch from his girdle, "take this pouch of 
rubies and give them to the wives of the dead 
52 



Peace, War, and Politics 



general of our division — one to each. He had, 
I think, but seventeen. His walk was quiet. 
Allah give him peace." 

"Stop," said Von der Doppelbauch. "I will 
take the rubies. I myself will charge myself 
with the task and will myself see that I do it 
myself. Give me them." 

"Be it so, Toomuch," assented the Sultan 
humbly. "Give them to him." 

"And now," continued the Field Marshal, 
"there is yet one other thing further still more." 
He drew a roll of paper from his pocket. 
"Toomuch," he said, "bring me yonder little 
table, with ink, quills and sand. I have here 
a manifesto for His Majesty to sign." 

"No, no," cried Abdul In renewed alarm, 
"Not another manifesto. Not that! I signed 
one only last week." 

"This is a new one," said the Field Marshal, 
as he lifted the table that Toomuch had 
brought, into place in front of the Sultan, and 
spread out the papers on it. "This is a bet- 
ter one. This is the best one yet." 

"What does it say?" said Abdul, peering 
53 



Further Foolishness 



at It miserably. "I can't read it. It's not in 
Turkish." 

"It is your last word of proud defiance to 
all your enemies," said the Marshal. 

"No, no," whined Abdul. "Not defiance; 
they might not understand." 

"Here you declare," went on the Field 
Marshal, with his big finger on the text, "your 
irrevocable purpose. You swear that rather 
than submit you will hurl yourself into the Bos- 
phorus." 

"Where does it say that?" screamed Abdul. 

"Here beside my thumb." 

"I can't do it, I can't do it," moaned the lit- 
tle Sultan. 

"More than that further," went on the Prus- 
sian, quite undisturbed, "you state hereby 
your fixed resolve, rather than give in, to cast 
yourself from the highest pinnacle of the top- 
most minaret of this palace." 

"Oh, not the highest; don't make it the high- 
est," moaned Abdul. 

"Your purpose is fixed. Nothing can alter 
it. Unless the Allied Powers withdraw from 
54 



Peace, War, and Politics 



their advance on Constantinople you swear that 
within one hour you will fill your mouth with 
mud and burn yourself alive." 

"Just Allah!" cried the Sultan, "does it say 
all that?" 

"All that," said Von der Doppelbauch. "All 
that within an hour. It is a splendid defiance. 
The Kaiser himself has seen it and admired it. 
'These,' he said, 'are the words of a man!' " 

"Did he say that?" said Abdul, evidently 
flattered. "And is he too about to hurl him- 
self off his minaret?" 

"For the moment, no," replied Von der Dop- 
pelbauch, sternly. 

"Well, well," said Abdul, and to my sur- 
prise he began picking up the pen and making 
ready. "I suppose if I must sign it, I must" — 
then he marked the paper and sprinkled it with 
sand. "For one hour? Well, well," he mur- 
mured. "Von der Doppelbauch Pasha," he 
added with dignity, "you are permitted to with- 
draw. Commend me to your Imperial Master, 
my brother. Tell him that when I am gone, 
he may have Constantinople, provided only" — 
55 



Further Foolishness 



and a certain slyness appeared In the Sultan's 
eye, "that he can get it. Farewell." 

The Field Marshal, majestic as ever, gath- 
ered up the manifesto, clicked his heels together 
and withdrew. 

As the door closed behind him, I had ex- 
pected the little Sultan to fall into hopeless col- 
lapse. 

Not at all. On the contrary, a look of pe- 
culiar cheerfulness spread over his features. 

He refilled his narghileh and began quietly 
smoking at it. 

"Toomuch," he said, quite cheerfully, "I 
see there is no hope." 

"Alas !" said the secretary. 

"I have now," went on the Sultan, "appar- 
ently but sixty minutes in front of me. I had 
hoped that the intervention of the United States 
might have saved me. It has not. Instead 
of it, I meet my fate. Well, well, it is Kis- 
met. I bow to it." 

He smoked away quite cheerfully. 

Presently he paused. 

"Toomuch," he said, "kindly go and fetch 
56 



Peace, War, and Politics 



me a sharp knife, double-edged if possible, but 
sharp, and a stout bowstring." 

Up to this time I had remained a mere spec- 
tator of what had happened. But now I 
feared that I was on the brink of witnessing 
an awful tragedy. 

"Good Heavens, Abdul !" I said, "what are 
you going to do?" 

"Do? Why kill myself, of course," the Sul- 
tan answered, pausing for a moment in an in- 
terval of his cheerful smoking. "What else 
should I do? What else is there to do? I 
shall first stab myself in the stomach and then 
throttle myself with the bowstring. In half an 
hour I shall be in paradise. Toomuch, summon 
hither from the inner harem Fatima and Fal- 
loola; they shall sit beside me and sing to me 
at the last hour, for I love them well, and 
later they too shall voyage with me to para- 
dise. See to it that they are both thrown a 
little later into the Bosphorus, for my heart 
yearns towards the two of them," and he added 
thoughtfully, "especially perhaps towards Fa- 
tima, but I have never quite made up my mind." 
57 



Further Foolishness 



The Sultan sat back with a little gurgle of 
contentment, the rose water bubbling soothingly 
in the bowl of his pipe. 

Then he turned to his secretary again. 

"Toomuch," he said, "you will at the same 
time send a bowstring to Codfish Pasha, my 
Chief of War — it is our sign, you know," he 
added in explanation to me — "it gives Codfish 
leave to kill himself. And, Toomuch, send a 
bowstring also to Beefhash Pasha, my Vizier, 
— good fellow, he will expect it, and to Mac- 
pherson Effendl, my financial adviser. Let 
them all have bowstrings." 

"Stop, stop," I pleaded. "I don't under- 
stand." 

"Why surely," said the little man, in evi- 
dent astonishment. "It is plain enough. What 
would you do in Canada? When your min- 
isters — as I think you call them — fail and no 
longer enjoy your support — do you not send 
them bowstrings?" 

"Never," I said. "They go out of office, 
but " 

"And they do not disembowel themselves on 
58 



Peace, War, and Politics 



their retirement? Have they not that priv- 
ilege?" 

"Never!" I said. "What an idea!" 

"The ways of the infidel," said the little Sul- 
tan, calmly resuming his pipe, "are beyond the 
compass of the true intelligence of the Faith- 
ful. Yet I thought it was so even as here. 
I had read in your newspapers that after your 
last election your ministers were buried alive 
— buried under a landslide, was it not? We 
thought it — here in Turkey — a noble fate for 
them." 

"They crawled out," I said. 

"Ishmillah!" ejaculated Abdul. "But go, 
Toomuch. And Hsten — thou also — for, in spite 
of all, thou hast served me well — shalt have a 
bowstring." 

"O master, master!" cried Toomuch, fall- 
ing on his knees in gratitude and clutching the 
sole of Abdul's slipper. "It is too kind." 

"Nay, nay," said the Sultan. "Thou hast 

deserved it. And I will go further. This 

stranger, too, my governess, this professor, 

bring also for the professor a bowstring, and 

59 



Further Foolishness 



a two-bladed knife! All Canada shall rejoice 
to hear of it. The students shall leap up like 
young lambs at the honour that will be done. 
Bring the knife, Toomuch; bring the knife 1" 

"Abdul," I said, "Abdul, this is too much. 
I refuse. I am not fit. The honour is too 
great." 

"Not so," said Abdul. "I am still Sultan. 
I insist upon it. For, listen, I have long pene- 
trated your disguise and your kind design, I 
saw it from the first. You knew all and came 
to die with me. It was kindly meant. But you 
shall die no common death; yours shall be the 
honour of the double knife — let it be extra 
sharp, Toomuch — and the bowstring." 

"Abdul," I urged, "it cannot be. You for- 
get. I have an appointment to be thrown into 
the Bosphorus." 

"The death of a dog! Never!" cried Ab- 
dul. "My will is still law. Toomuch, kill him 
on the spot. Hit him with the stool, throw 
the coffee at him " 

But at this moment there were heard loud 
cries and shouting, as in tones of great glad- 
60 



Peace, War, and Politics 



ness, in the outer hall of the palace. Doors 
swinging to and fro and the sound of many 
running feet. One heard above all the call — 
"It has come! It has come!" 

The Sultan looked up quickly. 

"Toomuch," he said eagerly and anxiously, 
"quick, see what it is. Hurry! hurry! Haste! 
Do not stay on ceremony. Drink a cup of cof- 
fee, give me five cents — fifty cents, anything — 
and take leave and see what it is." 

But before Toomuch could reply, a turbaned 
attendant had already burst in through the 
door unannounced and thrown himself at 
Abdul's feet. 

"Master! Master!" he cried. "It is here. 
It has come." As he spoke he held out in one 
hand a huge envelope, heavy with seals. I 
could detect in great letters stamped across it 
the words, WASHINGTON and OFFICE 
OF THE SECRETARY OF STATE. 

Abdul seized and opened the envelope with 
trembling hands. 

"It is it!" he cried — "It is sent by Smith 
Pasha, Minister under the Peace of Heaven 
6i 



Further Foolishness 



of the United States. It is the Intervention. I 
am saved." 

Then there was silence among us, breath- 
less and anxious. 

Abdul glanced down the missive, reading it 
in silence to himself. 

"Oh noble," he murmured, "oh generous! 
It is too much. Too splendid a lot!" 

"What does it say?" 

"Look," said the 3ultan. "The United 
States has used its good offices. It has inter- 
vened! All is settled. My fate is secure." 

"Yes, yes," I said, "but what is it?" 

"Is it believable?" exclaimed Abdul. "It 
appears that none of the belligerents cared 
about me at all. None had designs upon me. 
The war was not made, as we understood, Too- 
much, as an attempt to seize my person. All 
they wanted was Constantinople. Not me at 
all!" 

"Powerful Allah!" murmured Toomuch. 
"Why was it not so said?" 

"For me," said the Sultan, still consulting 
the letter, "great honours are prepared! I am 
62 



Peace, War, and Politics 



to leave Constantinople — that is the sole con- 
dition. It shall then belong to whoever can 
get it. Nothing could be fairer. It always 
has. I am to have a safe conduct — is it not 
noble? — to the United States. No one is to 
attempt to poison me — is it not generosity it- 
self? — neither on land — nor even — mark this 
especially, Toomuch — on board ship. Nor is 
any one to throw me overboard or otherwise 
transport me to paradise." 

"It passes belief!" murmured Toomuch 
Koffi. "Allah is indeed good." 

"In the United States itself," went on Ab- 
dul, "or, I should say, themselves, Toomuch, 
for are they not innumerable? I am to have 
a position of the highest trust, power and re- 
sponsibility." 

"Is it really possible?" I said, greatly sur- 
prised. 

"It is so written," said the Sultan. "I am 
to be placed at the head — as the sole head or 
sovereign of — how is It written? — a Turkish 
Bath Establishment In New York. There I am 
to enjoy the same freedom and to exercise just 

63 



Further Foolishness 



as much — it is so written — exactly as much po- 
litical power as I do here. Is it not glorious?" 

"Allah! Illallah!" cried the secretary. 

"You, Toomuch, shall come with me, for 
there is a post of great importance placed at 
my disposal — so it is written — under the title of 
Rubber Down. Toomuch, let our preparations 
be made at once. Notify Fatima and Falloola. 
Those two alone shall go. For it is a Christian 
country and I bow to its prejudices. Two, I 
understand, is the limit. But we must leave at 
once." 

The Sultan paused a moment and then looked 
at me. 

"And our good friend here," he added, "we 
must leave to get out of this Yildiz Kiosk by 
whatsoever magic means he came into it." 

Which I did. 

And I am assured, by those who know, that 
the intervention was made good and that Ab- 
dul and Toomuch may be seen to this day, or 
to any other day, moving to and fro in their 
slippers and turbans in their Turkish Bath Em- 
porium at the corner of Broadway and > 

64 



Peace, War, and Politics 



But stop; that would be saying too much: 
especially as Fatima and Falloola occupy the 
upstairs. 

And it is said that Abdul has developed a 
very special talent for heating up the tempera- 
ture for his Christian customers. 

Moreover it is the general opinion that 
whether or not the Kaiser and such people will 
get their deserts, Abdul Aziz has his. 



6i 



///. — In Merry Mexico 

I STOOD upon the platform of the little 
deserted railway station of the frontier 
and looked around at the wide prospect. 
"So this," I said to myself, "is Mex- 
ico!" 

About me was the great plain rolling away 
to the Sierras in the background. The railroad 
track traversed it in a thin line. There were 
no trees — only here and there a clump of cac- 
tus or chapparal, a tuft of dog-grass or a few 
patches of dogwood. At intervals in the dis- 
tance one could see a hacienda standing in ma- 
jestic solitude in a cup of the hills. In the blue 
sky floated little banderillos of white cloud, 
while a graceful hidalgo appeared poised on 
a crag on one leg with folded wings, or floated 
lazily in the sky on one wing with folded legs. 
There was a drowsy buzzing of cicadas half 
asleep in the cactus cups, and, from some hid- 
66 



Peace, War, and Politics 



den depth of the hills far in the distance, the 
tinkling of a mule bell. 

I had seen it all so often in moving pictures 
that I recognised the scene at once. 

"So this is Mexico?" I repeated. 

The station building beside of me was little 
more than a wooden shack. Its door was 
closed. There was a sort of ticket wicket open- 
ing at the side, but it too was closed. 

But as I spoke thus aloud, the wicket opened. 
There appeared in it the head and shoulders of 
a little wizened man, swarthy and with bright 
eyes and pearly teeth. 

He wore a black velvet suit with yellow fac- 
ings, and a tall straw hat running to a point. I 
seemed to have seen him a hundred times in 
comic opera. 

"Can you tell me when the next train " 

I began. 

The little man made a gesture of Spanish 
politeness. 

"Welcome to Mexico!" he said. 

"Could you tell me " I continued. 

"Welcome to our sunny Mexico 1" he re- 

67 



Further Foolishness 



peated — "our beautiful, glorious Mexico. Her 
heart throbs at the sight of you." 

"Would you mind " I began again. 

"Our beautiful Mexico, torn and distracted 
as she is, greets you. In the name of the de 
facto government, thrice welcome. Su casaV 
he added with a graceful gesture indicating the 
interior of his little shack. "Come in and 
smoke cigarettes and sleep. S>u casa! You are 
capable of Spanish, is it not?" 

"No," I said, "it Is not. But I wanted to 
know when the next train for the Interior " 

"Ah!" he rejoined more briskly. "You ad- 
dress me as a servant of the de facto govern- 
ment. Momentino! One moment!" 

He shut the wicket and was gone a long 
time. I thought he had fallen asleep. 

But he reappeared. He had a bundle of 
what looked like railway time tables, very 
ancient and worn. In his hand. 

"Did you say," he questioned, "the interior 
or the e:vterior?" 

"The interior, please." 

"Ah, good, excellent — for the interior — " 
68 



Peace, War, and Politics 



the little Mexican retreated into his shack and 
I could hear him murmuring — ^"for the in- 
terior, excellent — " as he moved to and fro. 

Presently he reappeared, a look of deep 
sorrow on his face. "Alas !" he said, shrugging 
his shoulders, "I am desolado. It has gonel 
The next train has gone!" 

"Gone! When?" 

"Alas! Who can tell? Yesterday, last 
month? But it has gone." 

"And when will there be another one?" I 
asked. 

"Ha !" he said, resuming a brisk official man- 
ner. "I understand. Having missed the next, 
you propose to take another one. Excellent! 
What business enterprise you foreigners have ! 
You miss your train! What do you do? Do 
you abandon your journey? No. Do you sit 
down — do you weep? No. Do you lose time? 
You do not." 

"Excuse me," I said, "but when is there an- 
other train?" 

"That must depend," said the little official, 
and as he spoke he emerged from his house 
69 



Further Foolishness 



and stood beside me on the platform fumbling 
among his railway guides. "The first question 
is, do you propose to take a de facto train or 
a de jure train?" 

"When do they go?" I asked. 

"There is a de jure train," continued the 
station master, peering into his papers, "at 
two P. M. — very good train — sleepers and din- 
ers — one at four, a through train — sleepers, 
observation car, dining car, corridor compart- 
ments — that also is a de jure train " 

"But what is the difference between the de 
jure and the de factoT^ 

"It's a distinction we generally make In 
Mexico : the de jure trains are those that ought 
to go ; that Is, in theory, they go. The de facto 
trains are those that actually do go. It Is a 
distinction clearly established In our cor- 
respondence with Huedro Huilson." 

"Do you mean Woodrow Wilson?" 

"Yes, Huedro Huilson, president — de jure 
— of the United States." 

"Oh," I said. "Now I understand. And 
when will there be a de facto train?" 
70 



Peace, War, and Politics 



"At any moment you like," said the little 
official with a bow. 

"But I don't see " 

"Pardon me — I have one here behind the 
shed on that side track — excuse me — one mo- 
ment and I will bring it." 

He disappeared and I presently saw him 
energetically pushing out from behind the shed 
a little railroad lorry or hand truck. 

"Now then," he said as he shoved his little 
car on to the main track, "this is the train. 
Seat yourself. I, myself, will take you." 

"And how much shall I pay? What is the 
fare to the interior?" I questioned. 

The little man waved the idea aside with a 
polite gesture. 

"The fare," he said, "let us not speak of it. 
Let us forget it. How much money have you?" 

"I have here," I said, taking out a roll of 
bills, "fifty dollars " 

"And that is all you have?" 

"Yes." 

"Then let that be the fare ! Why should I 
ask more? Were I an American, I might; but 
71 



Further Foolishness 



in our Mexico, no. What you have we take; 
beyond that we ask nothing. Let us forget it. 
Good ! And, now, would you prefer to travel 
first, second, or third class?" 

"First class, please," I said. 

"Very good. Let it be so," Here the little 
man took from his pocket a red label marked 
FIRST CLASS and tied it on the edge of the 
hand car. "It is more comfortable," he said. 
"Now seat yourself, seize hold of these two 
handles in front of you. Move them back and 
forward, thus. Beyond that you need do noth- 
ing. The working of the car, other than the 
mere shoving of the handles, shall be my task. 
Consider yourself, in fact, sehor, as my guest." 

We took our places. I applied myself, as 
directed, to the handles and the little car moved 
forward across the plain, 

"A glorious prospect," I said, as I gazed at 
the broad panorama. 

^'Magnijico! Is it not?" said my companion. 

"Alas! my poor Mexico. She wants nothing 

but water to make her the most fertile country 

of the globe ! Water and soil, those only, and 

72 



Peace, War, and Politics 



she would excel all others. Give her but water, 
soil, light, heat, capital and labour, and what 
could she not be ! And what do we see : dis- 
traction, revolution, destruction — pardon me, 
will you please stop the car a moment? I wish 
to tear up a little of the track behind us." 

I did as directed. My companion descended 
and with a little bar that he took from beneath 
the car, unloosed a few of the rails of the light 
track and laid them beside the road. 

"It is our custom," he explained, as he 
climbed on board again. "We Mexicans, when 
we move to and fro, always tear up the track 
behind us. But what was I saying? Ah, yes 
— destruction, desolation, alas, our Mexico !" 

He looked sadly up at the sky. 

"You speak," I said, "like a patriot. May 
I ask your name?" 

"My name is Raymon," he answered, with a 
bow, "Raymon Domenico y Miraflores de las 
Gracias." 

"And may I call you simply Raymon?" 

"I shall be delirious with pleasure if you 
will do so," he answered, "and dare I ask you, 
73 



Further Foolishness 



in return, your business In our beautiful coun- 
try?" 

The car, as we were speaking, had entered 
upon a long and gentle down grade across the 
plain, so that It ran without great effort on my 
part. 

"Certainly," I said. "I'm going Into the 
interior to see General Villa !" 

At the shock of the name, Raymon nearly 
fell off the car. 

"Villa ! General Francesco Villa ! It is not 
possible !" 

The little man was shivering with evident 
fear. 

"See him! See Villa! Not possible. Let 
me show you a picture of him Instead? But 
approach him — It Is not possible! He shoots 
everybody at sight!" 

"That's all right," I said. "I have a written 
safe conduct that protects me." 

"From whom?" 

"Here," I said, "look at them — I have two." 

Raymon took the documents I gave him and 
read aloud. 

74 



Peace, War, and Politics 



" 'The bearer Is on an important mission 
connected with American rights in Mexico. If 
any one shoots him he will be held to a strict 
accountabihty. W. W.' Ah ! Excellent ! He 
will be compelled to send in an itemised ac- 
count. Excellent ! And this other, let me see. 
'If anybody interferes with the bearer, I will 
knock his face in. T. R.' Admirable ! This 
Is, if anything, better than the other for use 
in our country. It appeals to our quick Mexi- 
can natures. It Is, as we say, simpatico. It 
touches us." 

"It is meant to," I said. 

"And may I ask," said Raymon, "the nature 
of your business with Villa?" 

"We are old friends," I answered. "I used 
to know him years ago when he kept a Mexican 
cigar store in Buffalo. It occurred to me that 
I might be able to help the cause of peaceful 
intervention. I have already had a certain ex- 
perience in Turkey. I am commissioned to 
make General Villa an offer." 

"I see," said Raymon. "In that case, if 
we are to find Villa let us make all haste for- 
75 



Further Foolishness 



ward. And first we must direct ourselves yon- 
der" — he pointed in a vague way towards the 
mountains, "where we must presently leave our 
car and go on foot, to the camp of General 
Carranza." 

"Carranza !" I exclaimed. "But he is fight- 
ing Villa!" 

"Exactly. It is possible — not certain — but 
possible, that he knows where Villa is. In our 
Mexico when two of our generalistas are fight- 
ing in the mountains, they keep coming across 
one another. It is hard to avoid it." 

"Good," I said. "Let us go forward." 

It was two days later that we reached Car- 
ranza's camp in the mountains. 

We found him just at dusk seated at a little 
table beneath a tree. 

His followers were all about, picketing their 
horses and lighting fires. 

The General, buried in a book before him, 
noticed neither the movements of his own men 
nor our approach. 

76 



Peace, War, and Politics 



I must say that I was surprised beyond meas- 
ure at his appearance. 

The popular idea of General Carranza as a 
rude bandit chief is entirely erroneous. 

I saw before me a quiet, scholarly-looking 
man, bearing every mark of culture and refine- 
ment. His head was bowed over the book in 
front of him, which I noticed with astonishment 
and admiration was Todhunter's Algebra. 
Close at his hand I observed a work on Decimal 
Fractions, while, from time to time, I saw the 
General lift his eyes and glance keenly at a 
multiplication table that hung on a bough be- 
side him. 

"You must wait a few moments," said an 
aide de camp, who stood beside us. "The Gen- 
eral is at work on a simultaneous equation!" 

"Is it possible?" I said in astonishment. 

The aide de camp smiled. "Soldiering to- 
day, my dear Sefior," he said, "is an exact sci- 
ence. On this equation will depend our entire 
food supply for the next week." 

"When will he get it done?" I asked 
anxiously. 

77 



Further Foolishness 



"Simultaneously," said the aide de camp. 

The General looked up at this moment and 
saw us. 

"Well?" he asked. 

"Your Excellency," said the aide de camp, 
"there is a stranger here on a visit of investi- 
gation to Mexico." 

"Shoot him!" said the General, and turned 
quickly to his work. 

The aide de camp saluted. 

"When?" he asked. 

"As soon as he likes," said the General. 

"You are fortunate, indeed," said the aide 
de camp in a tone of animation, as he led me 
away, still accompanied by Raymon. "You 
might have been kept waiting round for days. 
Let us get ready at once. You would like to 
be shot, would you not, smoking a cigarette, 
and standing beside your grave? Luckily, we 
have one ready. Now if you will wait a mo- 
ment, I will bring the photographer and his 
machine. There is still light enough, I think. 
What would you like it called? The Fate of a 
Spy? That's good, isn't it? Our syndicate can 
78 



Peace, War, and Politics 



always work up that into a two-reel film. All 
the rest of it — the camp, the mountains, the 
general, the funeral and so on — we can do to- 
morrow without you." 

He was all eagerness as he spoke. 

"One moment," I interrupted; "I am sure 
there is some mistake. I only wished to present 
certain papers and get a safe conduct from the 
General to go and see Villa." 

The aide de camp stopped abruptly. 

"Ah!" he said, "You are not here for a 
picture. A thousand pardons. Give me your 
papers — one moment — I will return to the Gen- 
eral and explain." 

He vanished, and Raymon and I waited in 
the growing dusk. 

"No doubt the General supposed," explained 
Raymon, as he lighted a cigarette, "that you 
were here for las machinas, the moving pic- 
tures." 

In a few minutes the aide de camp returned. 

"Come," he said, "the General will see you 
now." 

We returned to where we had left Carranza. 
79 



Further Foolishness 



The General rose to meet me with out- 
stretched hand and with a gesture of simple 
cordiality. 

"You must pardon my error," he said. 

"Not at all," I said. 

"It appears you do not desire to be shot." 

"Not at present." 

"Later, perhaps," said the General. "On 
your return, no doubt, provided," he added 
with grave courtesy that sat well on him, "that 
you do return. My aide de camp shall make 
a note of it. But at present you wish to be 
guided to Francesco Villa?" 

"If it is possible." 

"Quite easy. He is at present near here, in 
fact much nearer than he has any right to be." 
The General frowned. "We found this spot 
first. The light is excellent and the mountains, 
as you have seen, are wonderful for our pic- 
tures. This is, by every rule of decency, our 
scenery. Villa has no right to it. This is our 
revolution" — the General spoke with rising 
animation — ^"not his. When you see the fel- 
low, tell him from me — or tell his manager — 
80 



Peace, War, and Politics 



that he must either move his revolution further 
away — or, by Heaven, I'll — I'll use force 
against him. But stop," he checked himself. 
"You wish to see Villa. Good. You have 
only to follow the straight track over the moun- 
tain there. He is just beyond, at the little 
village in the hollow, El Corazon de las Quer- 
tas." 

The General shook hands and seated himself 
again at his work. The interview was at an 
end. We withdrew. 

The next morning we followed without dif- 
ficulty the path indicated. A few hours' walk 
over the mountain pass brought us to a little 
straggling village of adobe houses, sleeping 
drowsily in the sun. 

There were but few signs of life in its one 
street — a mule here and there tethered in the 
sun — and one or two Mexicans drowsily smok- 
ing in the shade. 

One building only, evidently newly made, 
and of lumber, had a decidedly American ap- 
pearance. Its doorway bore the sign GEN- 
8i 



Further Foolishness 



ERAL OFFICES OF THE COMPANY, and 

under it the notice KEEP OUT, while on one 
of its windows was painted GENERAL MAN- 
AGER and below it the legend NO ADMIS- 
SION, and on the other— SECRETARY'S 
OFFICE: GO AWAY. 

We therefore entered at once. 

"General Francesco Villa?" said a clerk, 
evidently American. "Yes, he's here all right. 
At least, this is the office." 

"And where is the General?" I asked. 

The clerk turned to an assistant at a desk 
in a corner of the room. 

"Where's Frank working this morning?" he 
asked. 

"Over down in the gulch," said the other, 
turning round for a moment. "There's an at- 
tack of American cavalry this morning." 

"Oh, yes, I forgot," said the chief clerk. "I 
thought it was the Indian Massacre, but I 
guess that's for to-morrow. Go straight to the 
end of the street and turn left about a half a 
mile and you'll find the boys down there." 

We thanked him and withdrew. 



Peace, War, and Politics 



We passed across the open plaza, and went 
down a narrow side road, bordered here and 
there with adobe houses, and so out into the 
open country. Here the hills rose again and 
the road that we followed wound sharply round 
a turn into a deep gorge, bordered with rocks 
and sage brush. We had no sooner turned the 
curve of the road than we came upon a scene 
of great activity. Men in Mexican costume 
were running to and fro apparently arranging 
a sort of barricade at the side of the road. 
Others seemed to be climbing the rocks on the 
further side of the gorge, as if seeking points 
of advantage. I noticed that all were armed 
with rifles and machetes and presented a for- 
midable appearance. Of Villa himself I could 
see nothing. But there was a grim reality about 
the glittering knives, the rifles and the maxim 
guns that I saw concealed in the sage brush be- 
side the road. 

"What is it?" I asked of a man who was 
standing idle, watching the scene from the 
same side of the road as ourselves. 
83 



Further Foolishness 



"Attack of American cavalry," he said non- 
chalantly. 

"Here!" I gasped. 

"Yep, In about ten minutes: soon as they 
are ready." 

"Where's Villa?" 

"It's him they're attacking. They chase him 
here, see ! This Is an ambush. Villa rounds 
on them right here, and they fight to a finish!" 

"Great Heavens!" I exclaimed. "How do 
you know that?" 

"Know It? Why because I seen it. Ain't 
they been trying It out for three days? Why, 
I'd be in it myself only I'm off work — got a 
sore toe yesterday — horse stepped on it." 

All this was, of course, quite unintelligible 
to me. 

"But It's right here where they're going to 
fight?" I asked. 

"Sure," said the American, as he moved 
carelessly aside, "as soon as the boss gets it all 
ready." 

I now noticed for the first time a heavy- 
looking man in an American tweed suit and a 
84 



Peace, War, and Politics 



white plug hat, moving to and fro and calling 
out directions with an air of authority. 

"Here!" he shouted, "what in h 1 are 

you doing with that machine gun? You've got 
it clean out of focus. Here, Jose, come in 
closer — that's right — steady there now, and 
don't forget, at the second whistle you and Pete 
are dead. Here, you, Pete, how in thunder do 
you think you can die there? You're all out of 
the picture and hidden by that there sage bush. 
That's no place to die. And, boys, remember 
one thing, now, die slow. Ed" — he turned 
and called apparently to some one invisible be- 
hind the rocks — "when them two boys is killed, 
turn her round on them, slew her round good 
and get them centre focus. Now then, are you 
all set? Ready?" 

At this moment the speaker turned and 
saw Raymon and myself. "Here, youse," he 
shouted, "get further back; you're in the picture. 
Or, say, no, stay right where you are. You," 
he said, pointing to me, "stay right where you 
are and I'll give you a dollar to just hold that 
horror; you understand; just keep on register- 
85 



Further Foolishness 



Ing it. Don't do another thing; just register 
that face." 

His words were meaningless to me. I had 
never known before that it was possible to 
make money by merely registering my face. 

"No, no," cried out Raymon, "my friend here 
is not wanting work. He has a message, a mes- 
sage of great importance for General Villa." 

"Well," called back the boss, "he'll have to 
wait. We can't stop now. All ready, boys? 
One — two — now!" 

And with that he put a whistle to his lips 
and blew a long shrill blast. 

Then in a moment the whole scene was trans- 
formed. Rifle shots rang out from every crag 
and bush that bordered the gully. 

A wild scamper of horses' hoofs was heard 
and in a moment there came tearing down the 
road a whole troop of mounted Mexicans, evi- 
dently in flight, for they turned and fired from 
their saddles as they rode. The horses that 
carried them were wild with excitement and 
flecked with foam. The Mexican cavalry men 
shouted and yelled, brandishing their machetes 
86 



Peace, War, and Politics 



and firing their revolvers. Here and there a 
horse and rider fell to the ground in a great 
whirl of sand and dust. In the thick of the 
press, a leader of ferocious aspect, mounted 
upon a gigantic black horse, waved his som- 
brero about his head. 

"Villa — it is Villa !" cried Raymon, tense 
with excitement; "is he not magnijicof But 
look! Look — the Americanos! They are 
coming!" 

It was a glorious sight to see them as they 
rode madly on the heels of the Mexicans — a 
whole company of American cavalry, their 
horses shoulder to shoulder, the men bent low 
in their saddles, their carbines gripped in their 
hands. They rode in squadrons and in line, 
not like the shouting, confused mass of the Mex- 
icans — but steady, disciplined, irresistible. 

On the right flank in front a grey-haired of- 
ficer steadied the charging line. The excite- 
ment of it was maddening. 

"Go it," I shouted in uncontrollable emotion. 
"Your Mexicans are licked, Raymon, they're 
no good!" 

87 



Further Foolishness 



"But look!" said Raymon; "see — the am- 
bush, the ambuscada !" 

For as they reached the centre of the gorge 
in front of us the Mexicans suddenly checked 
their horses, bringing them plunging on their 
haunches in the dust, and then swung round 
upon their pursuers, while from every crag and 
bush at the side of the gorge the concealed 
riflemen sprang into view — and the sputtering 
of the machine guns swept the advancing col- 
umn with a volley. 

We could see the American line checked as 
with the buffet of a great wave, men and horses 
rolling in the road. Through the smoke one 
saw the grey-haired leader — dismounted, his 
uniform torn, his hat gone, but still brandish- 
ing his sword and calling his orders to his men, 
his face as one caught in a flash of sunlight, 
steady and fearless. His words I could not 
hear, but one saw the American cavalry, still 
unbroken, dismount, throw themselves behind 
their horses, and fire with steady aim into the 
mass of the Mexicans. We could see the Mex- 
icans in front of where we stood falling thick 



Peace, War, and Politics 



and fast, in little huddled bundles of colour, 
kicking the sand. The man Pete had gone 
down right in the foreground and was breath- 
ing out his soul before our eyes. 

"Well done," I shouted. "Go to it, boys! 
You can lick 'em yet ! Hurrah for the United 
States. Look, Raymon, look! They've shot 
down the crew of the machine guns. See, see 
— the Mexicans are turning to run — at 'em, 
boys! — they're waving the American flag! 
There it is in all the thick of the smoke ! Hark ! 
There's the bugle call to mount again ! They're 
going to charge again! Here they come!" 

As the American cavalry came tearing for- 
ward, the Mexicans leaped from their places 
with gestures of mingled rage and terror as if 
about to break and run. 

The battle, had it continued, could have but 
one end. 

But at this moment we heard from the town 
behind us the long sustained note of a steam 
whistle blowing the hour of noon. 

In an instant the firing ceased. 

The battle stopped. The Mexicans picked 
89 



Further Foolishness 



themselves up off the ground and began brush- 
ing off the dust from their black velvet jackets. 
The American cavalry reined in their horses. 
Dead Pete came to life. General Villa and the 
American leader and a number of others 
strolled over towards the boss, who stood be- 
side the fence vociferating his comments. 

"That won't do!" he was shouting. "That 
won't do! Where in blazes was that infernal 
Sister of Mercy? Miss Jenkinson!" and he 
called to a tall girl, whom I now noticed for 
the first time among the crowd, wearing a sort 
of khaki costume and a short skirt and carry- 
ing a water bottle in a strap. "You never got 
into the picture at all, I want you right In 
there among the horses, under their feet." 

"Land sakes!" said the Sister of Mercy. 
"You ain't no right to ask me to go in there 
among them horses and be trampled." 

"Ain't you paid to be trampled?" said the 
manager angrily. Then as he caught sight of 
Villa he broke off and said: "Frank, you boys 
done fine. It's going to be a good act, all right. 
But it ain't just got the right amount of ginger 
90 



Peace, War, and Politics 



in it yet. We'll try her over once again, any- 
way." 

"Now, boys," he continued, calling out to 
the crowd with a voice like a megaphone, "this 

afternoon at three-thirty Hospital scene. 

I only want the wounded, the doctors and the 
Sisters of Mercy. All the rest of youse is free 
till ten to-morrow — for the Indian Massacre. 
Everybody up for that." 

It was an hour or two later that I had my 
interview with Villa in a back room of the lit- 
tle posada, or inn, of the town. The General 
had removed his ferocious wig of straight black 
hair, and substituted a check suit for his war- 
like costume. He had washed the darker part 
of the paint off his face — in fact, he looked 
once again the same Frank Villa that I used to 
know when he kept his Mexican cigar store in 
Buffalo. 

"Well, Frank," I said, "I'm afraid I came 
down here under a misunderstanding." 

"Looks like it," said the General, as he rolled 
a cigarette. 

91 



Further Foolishness 



"And you wouldn't care to go back even for 
the offer that I am commissioned to make — 
your old job back again, and half the profits 
on a new cigar to be called the Francesco 
Villa?" 

The General shook his head. 

"It sounds good, all right," he said, "but 
this moving-picture business is better." 

"I see," I said, "I hadn't understood. I 
thought there really was a revolution here in 
Mexico." 

"No," said Villa, shaking his head, "been 
no revolution down here for years — not since 
Diaz. The picture companies came in and 
took the whole thing over ; they made us a fair 
offer — so much a reel straight out, and a roy- 
alty, and let us divide up the territory as we 
liked. The first film we done was the bombard- 
ment of Vera Cruz — say, that was a dandy — 
did you see it?" 

"No," I said. 

"They had us all in that," he continued. "I 
done an American Marine. Lots of people 
think it all real when they see it." 
92 



Peace, War, and Politics 



*'Why," I said, "nearly everybody does. 
Even the President " 

"Oh, I guess he knows," said Villa, "but, you 
see, there's tons of money in It and it's good 
for business, and he's too decent a man to give 
it away. Say, I heard the boys saying there's 
a war in Europe. I wonder what company 
got that up, eh? But I don't believe it'll draw. 
There ain't the scenery for it that we have in 
Mexico." 

"Alas!" murmured Raymon. "Our beauti- 
ful Mexico. To what is she fallen! Needing 
only water, air, light and soil to make her " 

"Come on, Raymon," I said, "let's go home." 



93 



IV, — Over the Grape Juice, or. 
The Peace Makers 



CHARACTERS 

Mr. W. Jennings Bryan Mr. Norman Angell 

Dr. David Starr Jordan A Lady Pacifist 

A Philanthropist • , A Negro President 

An Eminent Divine The Man on the Street 

The General Public And many others 

WAR," said the Negro President of 
Haiti, "is a sad spectacle. It 
shames our polite civilisation." 
As he spoke he looked about 
him at the assembled company around the huge 
dinner table, glittering with cut glass and white 
linen, and brilliant with hot-house flowers. 

"A sad spectacle," he repeated, rolling his 
big eyes in his black and yellow face that was 
94 



Peace, War, and Politics 



melancholy with the broken pathos of the 
African race. 

The occasion was a notable one. It was the 
banquet of the Peace Makers' Conference of 
19 17, and the company gathered about the 
board was as notable as it was numerous. 

At the head of the table the genial Mr. Jen- 
nings Bryan presided as host, his broad counte- 
nance beaming with amiability, and a tall 
flagon of grape juice standing beside his hand. 
A little further down the table one saw the 
benevolent head and placid physiognomy of 
Mr. Norman Angell, bowed forward as if in 
deep calculation. Within earshot of Mr. 
Bryan, but not listening to him, one recognised 
without the slightest difficulty the great ichthy- 
ologist. Dr. David Starr Jordan, director in 
chief of the World's Peace Foundation, while 
the bland features of a gentleman from China, 
and the presence of a yellow delegate from the 
Mosquito Coast, gave ample evidence that the 
company had been gathered together without 
reference to color, race, religion, education, or 
other prejudices whatsoever. 
95 



Further Foolishness 



But it would be out of the question to indi- 
cate by name the whole of the notable assem- 
blage. Indeed, certain of the guests, while car- 
rying in their faces and attitudes something 
strangely and elusively familiar, seemed in a 
sense to be nameless, and to represent rather 
types and abstractions than actual personal- 
ities. Such was the case, for instance, with a 
female member of the company, seated in a 
place of honour near the host, whose demure 
garb and gentle countenance seemed to indi- 
cate her as a Lady Pacifist, but denied all fur- 
ther identification. The mild, ecclesiastical 
features of a second guest, so entirely Chris- 
tian in its expression as to be almost devoid of 
expression altogether, marked him at once as 
An Eminent Divine, but while puzzlingly sug- 
gestive of an actual and well-known person, 
seemed to elude exact recognition. His accent, 
when he presently spoke, stamped him as Brit- 
ish and his garb was that of the Established 
Church. Another guest appeared to answer 
to the general designation of Capitalist or Phi- 
lanthropist, and seemed from his prehensible 

96 



Peace, War, and Politics 



grasp upon his knife and fork to typify the 
Money Power. In front of this guest, doubt- 
less with a view of indicating his extreme wealth 
and the consideration in which he stood, was 
placed a floral decoration representing a broken 
bank, with the figure of a ruined depositor en- 
twined among the debris. 

Of these nameless guests, two individuals 
alone, from the very insignificance of their ap- 
pearance, from their plain dress, unsuited to the 
occasion, and from the puzzled expression of 
their faces, seemed out of harmony with the 
galaxy of distinction which surrounded them. 
They .seemed to speak only to one another, and 
even that somewhat after the fashion of an ap- 
preciative chorus to what the rest of the com- 
pany were saying; while the manner in which 
they rubbed their hands together and hung upon 
the words of the other speakers in humble ex- 
pectancy seemed to imply that they were pres- 
ent in the hope of gathering rather than shed- 
ding light. To these two humble and obsequious 
guests no attention whatever was paid, though 
it was understood, by those who knew, that 
97 



Further Foolishness 



their names were The General Public and The 
Man on the Street. 

"A sad spectacle," said the Negro President, 
and he sighed as he spoke. "One wonders if our 
civilisation, if our moral standards themselves, 
are slipping from us." Then, half in reverie, 
or as if overcome by the melancholy of his own 
thought, he lifted a spoon from the table and 
slid it gently into the bosom of his faded uni- 
form. 

'Tut back that spoon!" called The Lady 
Pacifist sharply. 

"Pardon !" said the Negro President humbly, 
as he put it back. The humiliation of genera- 
tions of servitude was in his voice. 

"Come, come," exclaimed Mr. Jennings 
Bryan cheerfully, "try a little more of the grape 
juice?" 

"Does it intoxicate?" asked the President. 

"Never," answered Mr. Bryan. "Rest as- 
sured of that. I can guarantee it. The grape 
is picked in the dark. It is then carried, still 
in the dark, to the testing room. There every 
particle of alcohol is removed. Try it" 
98 



PeacCj War, and Politics 



"Thank you," said the President. "I am no 
longer thirsty." 

"Will anybody have some more of the grape 
juice?" asked Mr. Bryan, running his eye along 
the ranks of the guests. 

No one spoke. 

"Will anybody have some more ground pea- 
nuts?" 

No one moved. 

"Or does anybody want any more of the 
shredded tan bark? No? Or will somebody 
have another spoonful of sunflower seeds?" 

There was still no sign of assent. 

"Very well, then," said Mr. Bryan, "the 
banquet, as such, is over, and we now come to 
the more serious part of our business. I need 
hardly tell you that we are here for a serious 
purpose. We are here to do good. That I 
know is enough to enlist the ardent sympathy 
of everybody present." 

There was a murmur of assent. 

"Personally," said The Lady Pacifist, "I do 
nothing else." 

"Neither do I," said the guest who has been 
99 



Further Foolishness 



designated The Philanthropist, "whether I am 
producing oil, or making steel, or building mo- 
tor cars." 

"Does he build motor cars?" whispered the 
humble person called The Man on the Street 
to his fellow. The General Public. 

"All great philanthropists do things like 
that," answered his friend. "They do it as a 
social service, so as to benefit humanity; any 
money they make is just an accident. They 
don't really care about it a bit. Listen to him. 
He's going to say so." 

"Indeed, our business itself," The Philan- 
thropist continued, while his face lighted up 
with unselfish enthusiasm, "our business it- 
self " 

"Hush, hush!" said Mr. Bryan gently. "We 
know " 

"Our business itself," persisted The Philan- 
thropist, "is one great piece of philanthropy." 

Tears gathered in his eyes. 

"Come, come," said Mr. Bryan firmly, "we 
must get to business. Our friend here," he con- 
tinued, turning to the company at large and in- 
lOO 



Peace, War, and Politics 



dicating the Negro President on his right, "has 
come to us in great distress. His beautiful 
island of Haiti is and has been for many years 
overwhelmed in civil war. Now he learns that 
not only Haiti, but also Europe is engulfed in 
conflict. He has heard that we are making pro- 
posals for ending the war — indeed, I may say 
are about to declare that the war in Europe 
must stop — I think. I am right, am I not, my 
friends?" 

There was a general chorus of assent. 

"Naturally then," continued Mr. Bryan^ 
"our friend the President of Haiti, who is 
overwhelmed with grief at what has been hap- 
pening in his island, has come to us for help. 
That is correct, is it not?" 

"That's it, gentleman," said the Negro Pres- 
ident, in a voice of some emotion, wiping the 
sleeve of his faded uniform across his eyes. 
"The situation is quite beyond my control. In 
fact," he added, shaking his head pathetically 
as he relapsed Into more natural speech, "dis 
hyah chile, genTn, is clean done beat with it. 
Dey ain't doin' nuffin' on the island but shootin'^ 

lOI 



Further Foolishness 



burnin', and klllln' somethin' awful. Lawd a 
massy! it's just like a real civilised country, 
all right, now. Down in our island we col- 
oured people is feeling just as bad as youse 
did when all them poor white folks was mur- 
dered on the Liisttania!" 

But the Negro President had no sooner used 
the words, "murdered on the Lusitania," than 
a chorus of dissent and disapproval broke out 
all down the table. 

"My dear sir, my dear sir,'' protested Mr. 
Bryan, "pray moderate your language a little, 
if you please. Murdered? Oh, dear, dear 
me, how can we hope to advance the cause of 
peace if you insist on using such terms?" 

"Ain't it that? Wasn't it murder?" asked 
the President, perplexed. 

"We are all agreed here," said The Lady 
Pacifist, "that it is far better to call it an in- 
cident. We speak of the 'Lusitania Incident,' " 
she added didactically, "just as one speaks of 
the Arabic Incident, and the Cavell Incident, 
and other episodes of the sort. It makes it 
so much easier to forget." 

I02 



Peace, War, and Politics 



"True, quite true," murmured The Eminent 
Divine, "and then one must remember that 
there are always two sides to everything. There 
are two sides to murder. We must not let our- 
selves forget that there is always the mur- 
derer's point of view to consider." 

But by this time the Negro President was 
obviously confused and out of his depth. The 
conversation had reached a plane of civilisa- 
tion which was beyond his reach. 

The genial Mr. Bryan saw fit to come to his 
rescue. 

"Never mind," said Mr. Bryan soothingly. 
"Our friends here will soon settle all your dif- 
ficulties for you. I'm going to ask them, one 
after the other, to advise you. They will tell 
you the various means that they are about to 
apply to stop the war in Europe, and you may 
select any that you like for your use in Haiti. 
We charge you nothing for it, except of course 
your fair share of the price of this grape juice 
and the shredded nuts." 

The President nodded. 

"I am going to ask our friend on my right" 
103 



Further Foolishness 



— and here Mr. Bryan indicated The Lady 
Pacifist — "to speak first." 

There was a movement of general expectancy 
and the two obsequious guests at the foot of 
the table, of whom mention has been made, 
were seen to nudge one another and whisper, 
"Isn't this splendid?" 

"You are not asking me to speak first merely 
because I am a woman?" asked The Lady Pac- 
ifist. 

"Oh no," said Mr. Bryan, with charming 
tact. 

"Very good," said the lady, adjusting her 
glasses. "As for stopping the war, I warn you, 
as I have warned the whole world, that it may 
be too late. They should have called me in 
sooner. That was the mistake. If they had 
sent for me at once and had put my picture in 
the papers both in England and Germany with 
the inscription 'The True Woman of To-day,' 
I doubt if any of the men who looked at it 
would have felt that it was worth while to 
fight. But, as things are, the only advice I 
can give is this. Everybody is wrong (except 
104 



Peace, War, and Politics 



me). The Germans are a very naughty peo- 
ple. But the Belgians are worse. It was very, 
very wicked of the Germans to bombard the 
houses of the Belgians. But how naughty of 
the Belgians to go and sit in their houses while 
they were bombarded. It is to that that I at- 
tribute — with my infallible sense of justice — 
the dreadful loss of life. So you see the only 
conclusion that I can reach is that everybody is 
very naughty and that the only remedy would 
be to appoint me a committee — me and a few 
others, though the others don't really matter — 
to make a proper settlement. I hope I make 
myself clear." 

The Negro President shook his head and 
looked mystified. 

"Us coloured folks," he said, "wouldn't 
quite understand that. We done got the idea 
that sometimes there's such a thing as a quarrel 
that is right and just." The President's melan- 
choly face lit up with animation and his voice 
rose to the sonorous vibration of the negro 
preacher. "We learn that out of the Bible, we 
105 



Further Foolishness 



coloured folks — we learn to smite the ungod- 
ly " 

"Pray, pray," said Mr. Bryan soothingly, 
"don't introduce religion, let me beg of you. 
That would be fatal. We peace-makers are all 
agreed that there must be no question of re- 
ligion raised." 

"Exactly so," murmured The Eminent Di- 
vine, "my own feelings exactly. The name of 
— of — the Deity should never be brought in. 
It inflames people. Only a few weeks ago I 
was pained and grieved to the heart to hear a 
woman in one of our London streets raving 
that the German Emperor was a murderer — 
her child had been killed that night by a bomb 
from a Zeppelin — she had its body in a cloth 
hugged to her breast as she talked — Thank 
Heaven, they keep these things out of the news- 
papers — and she was calling down God's 
vengeance on the Emperor. Most deplorable ! 
Poor creature, unable, I suppose, to realise the 
Emperor's exalted situation, his splendid line- 
age, the wonderful talent with which he can 
draw pictures of the apostles with one hand 
io6 



Peace, War, and Politics 



while he writes an appeal to his Mohammedan 
comrades with the other. I dined with him 
once," he added, in modest afterthought. 

*'I dined with him, too," said Dr. Jordan. 
"I shall never forget the impression he made. 
As he entered the room accompanied by his 
staff, the Emperor looked straight at me and 
said to one of his aides, 'Who is this?' 'This 
is Dr. Jordan,' said the officer. The Emperor 
put out his hand. 'So this is Dr. Jordan,' he 
said. I never witnessed such an exhibition of 
brain power in my life. He had seized my 
name in a moment and held it for three sec- 
onds with all the tenaciousness of a Hohen- 
zollern." 

"But may I," continued the Director of the 
World's Peace, "add a word to what has been 
said to make it still clearer to our friend? I 
will try to make it as simple as one of my lec- 
tures in Ichthyology. I know of nothing sim- 
pler than that." 

Everybody murmured assent. The Negro 
President put his. hand to his ear. 

"Theology?" he said. 
107 



Further Foolishness 



"Ichthyology," said Dr. Jordan. "It is bet- 
ter, fiut just listen to this. War Is waste. It 
destroys the tissues. It is exhausting and fa- 
tiguing and may in extreme cases lead to death." 

The learned gentleman sat back in his seat 
and took a refreshing drink of rain water from 
a glass beside him, while a murmur of applause 
ran round the table. It was known and recog- 
nised that the speaker had done more than 
any living man to establish the fact that war 
is dangerous, that gunpowder, if heated, ex- 
plodes, that fire burns, that fish swim, and other 
great truths without which the work of the 
peace endowment would appear futile. 

"And now," said Mr. Bryan, looking about 
him with the air of a successful toastmaster, 
"I am going to ask our friend here to give us 
his views." 

Renewed applause bore witness to the popu- 
larity of The Philanthropist, whom Mr. Bryan 
had indicated with a wave of his hand. 

The Philanthropist cleared his throat. 

"In our business " he began. 

Mr. Bryan plucked him gently by the sleeve. 
io8 



Peace, War, and Politics 



"Never mind your business just now," he whis- 
pered. 

The Philanthropist bowed in assent and con- 
tinued: "I will come at once to the subject. 
My own feeling is that the true way to end 
war is to try to spread abroad in all directions 
goodwill and brotherly love." 

"Hear, hear!" cried the assembled company. 

"And the great way to inspire brotherly love 
all round is to keep on getting richer and richer 
till you have so much money that every one loves 
you. Money, gentlemen, is a glorious thing." 

At this point Mr. Norman Angell, who had 
remained silent hitherto, raised his head from 
his chest and murmured drowsily: 

"Money, money, there isn't anything but 
money. Money is the only thing there is. 
Money and property, property and money. If 
you destroy it, it is gone; if you smash it, it 
isn't there. All the rest is a great illus " 

And with this he dozed off again into silence. 

"Our poor Angell is asleep again," said The 
Lady Pacifist. 

Mr. Bryan shook his head. "He's been that 
109 



Further Foolishness 



way ever since the war began, — sleeps all the 
time, and keeps muttering that there isn't any 
war, that people only imagine it, in fact that 
it is all an illusion. But I fear we are inter- 
rupting you," he added, turning to The Philan- 
thropist. 

"I was just saying," continued that gentle- 
man, "that you can do anything with money. 
You can stop a war with it If you have enough 
of it, in ten minutes. I don't care what kind 
of war it is, or what the people are fighting 
for, whether they are fighting for conquest or 
fighting for their homes and their children, I 
can stop It, stop it absolutely by my grip on 
money, without firing a shot or incurring the 
slightest personal danger." 

The Philanthropist spoke with the greatest 
emphasis, reaching out his hand and clutching 
his fingers in the air. 

"Yes, gentlemen," he went on, "I am speak- 
ing here not of theories but of facts. This is 
what I am doing and what I mean to do. 
You've no idea how amenable people are, espe- 
cially poor people, struggling people, those with 
no 



Peace, War, and Politics 



ties and responsibilities, to the grip of money. 
I went the other day to a man I know, the 
head of a bank, where I keep a little money — 
just a fraction of what I make, gentlemen, a 
mere nothing to me but everything to this man 
because he is still not rich and is only fighting 
his way up. 'Now,' I said to him, 'you are 
English, are you not?' 'Yes, sir,' he answered. 
'And I understand you mean to help along the 
loan to England with all the power of your 
bank.' 'Yes,' he said, 'I mean it and I'll do it.' 
'Then I'll tell you what,' I said, 'you lend one 
penny, or help to lend one penny, to the people 
of England or the people of France, and I'll 
break you, I'll grind you into poverty — you and 
your wife and children and all that belongs to 
you.' " 

The Philanthropist had spoken with so great 
an intensity that there was a deep stillness over 
the assembled company. The Negro President 
had straightened up in his seat, and as he looked 
at the speaker there was something in his erect 
back and his stern face and the set of his faded 
III 



Further Foolishness 



uniform that somehow turned him, African 
though he was, into a soldier. 

"Sir," he said, with his eye riveted on the 
speaker's face, "what happened to that banker 
man?" 

"The fool!" said The Philanthropist, "he 
wouldn't hear — he defied me — he said that 
there wasn't money enough in all my business 
to buy the soul of a single Englishman. I had 
his directors turn him from his bank that day, 
and he's enlisted, the scoundrel, and is gone to 
the war. But his wife and family are left be- 
hind: they shall learn what the grip of the 
money power is — learn it in misery and pov- 
erty." 

"My good sir," said the Negro President 
slowly and impressively, "do you know why 
your plan of stopping war wouldn't work in 
Haiti?" 

"No," said The Philanthropist. 

"Because our black people there would kill 
you. Whichever side they were on, whatever 
they thought of the war — they would take a 
man like you and lead you out into the town 

112 



Peace, War, and Politics 



square, and stand you up against the side of 
an adobe house, and they'd shoot you. Come 
down to Haiti, if you doubt my words, and 
try it." 

"Thank you," said The Philanthropist, re- 
suming his customary manner of undisturbed 
gentleness, "I don't think I will. I don't think 
somehow that I could do business in Haiti." 

The passage at arms between the Negro 
President and The Philanthropist had thrown 
a certain confusion into the hitherto agreeable 
gathering. Even The Eminent Divine was seen 
to be slowly shaking his head from side to side, 
an extreme mark of excitement which he never 
permitted himself except under stress of pas- 
sion. The two humble guests at the foot of 
the table were visibly perturbed. "Say, I don't 
like that about the banker," squeaked one of 
them. "That ain't right, eh, what? I don't 
like it." 

Mr. Bryan was aware that the meeting was 
in danger of serious disorder. He rapped 
loudly on the table for attention. When he had 
at last obtained silence, he spoke. 
"3 



Further Foolishness 



"I have kept my own views to the last," he 
said, "because I cannot but feel that they pos- 
sess a peculiar importance. There is, my dear 
friends, every prospect that within a measur- 
able distance of time I shall be able to put 
them into practice. I am glad to be able to 
announce to you the practical certainty that four 
years from now I shall be President of the 
United States." 

At this announcement the entire company 
broke Into spontaneous and heartfelt applause. 
It had long been felt by all present that Mr. 
Bryan was certain to be President of the United 
States If only he ran for the office often enough, 
but that the glad moment had actually arrived 
seemed almost too good for belief. 

"Yes, my friends," continued the genial host, 
"I have just had a communication from my 
dear friend Wilson, In which he tells me that 
he, himself, will never contest the office again. 
The Presidency, he says. Interfered too much 
with his private life. In fact, I am authorised 
to state in confidence that his wife forbids him 
to run." 

114 



Peace, War, and Politics 



"But, my dear Jennings," interposed Dr. 
Jordan thoughtfully, "what about Mr. Hughes 
and Colonel Roosevelt?" 

"In that quarter my certainty in the matter 
is absolute. I have calculated it out mathemati- 
cally that I am bound to obtain, in view of my 
known principles, the entire German vote — 
which carries with it all the great breweries 
of the country — the whole Austrian vote, all 
the Hungarians of the sugar refineries, the 
Turks — in fact, my friends, I am positive that 
either Mr. Hughes or Colonel Roosevelt, if he 
dares to run, will carry nothing but the Ameri- 
can vote !" 

Loud applause greeted this announcement. 

"And now let me explain my plan, which I 
believe is shared by a great number of sane, 
and other, pacifists in the country. All the 
great nations of the world will be invited to 
form a single international force consisting of 
a fleet so powerful and so well equipped that 
no single nation will dare to bid it defiance." 

Mr. Bryan looked about him with a glance 
of something like triumph. The whole com- 
115 



Further Foolishness 



pany, and especially the Negro President, were 
now evidently interested. "Say," whispered The 
General Public to his companion, "this sounds 
like the real thing? Eh, what? Isn't he a 
peach of a thinker?" 

"What flag will your fleet fly?" asked the 
Negro President, 

"The flags of all nations," said Mr. Bryan. 

"Where will you get your sailors?" 

"From all the nations," said Mr. Bryan, 
"but the uniform will be all the same, a plain 
white blouse with blue insertions, and white 
duck trousers with the word PEACE stamped 
across the back of them in big letters. This 
will help to impress the sailors with the almost 
sacred character of their functions." 

"But what will the fleet's functions be?" 
asked the President. 

"Whenever a quarrel arises," explained Mr. 
Bryan, "it will be submitted to a Board. Who 
will be on this Board, in addition to myself, I 
cannot as yet say. But it's of no consequence. 
Whenever a case is submitted to the Board it 
will think it over for three years. It will then 
ii6 



Peace, War, and Politics 



announce its decision — if any. After that, if 
any one nation refuses to submit, its ports will 
be bombarded by the Peace Fleet." 

Rapturous expressions of approval greeted 
Mr. Bryan's explanation. 

"But I don't understand," said the Negro 
President, turning his puzzled face to Mr. 
Bryan. "Would some of these ships be British 
ships?" 

"Oh, certainly. In view of the dominant size 
of the British Navy about one-quarter of all 
the ships would be British ships," 

"And the sailors British sailors?" 

"Oh, yes," said Mr. Bryan, "except that they 
would be wearing international breeches, — a 
most important point." 

"And if the Board, made up of all sorts of 
people, were to give a decision against Eng- 
land, then these ships — British ships with Brit- 
ish sailors — would be sent to bombard Eng- 
land itself." 

"Exactly," said Mr. Bryan. "Isn't it beau- 
tifully simple? And to guarantee its working 
properly," he continued, "just in case we have 
117 



Further Foolishness 



to use the fleet against England, we're going 
to ask Admiral Jellicoe himself to take com- 
mand." 

The Negro President slowly shook his head. 

"Marse Bryan," he said, "you notice what 
I say. I know Marse Jellicoe. I done seen him 
lots of times when he was just a lieutenant, 
down in the harbor of Port au Prince. If 
youse folks put up this proposition to Marse 
Jellicoe, he'll just tell the whole lot of you to 
go plumb to " 

But the close of the sentence was lost by a 
sudden interruption. A servant entered with 
a folded telegram in his hand. 

"For me?" said Mr. Bryan, with a winning 
smile. 

"For the President of Haiti, sir," said the 
man. 

The President took the telegram and opened 
it clumsily with his finger and thumb amid a 
general silence. Then he took from his pocket 
and adjusted a huge pair of spectacles with a 
horn rim and began to read: 

"Well, I 'clare to goodness!" he said. 
ii8 



Peace, War, and Politics 



"Who is it from?" said Mr. Bryan. "Is it 
anything about me?" 

The Negro President shook his head. "It's 
from Haiti," he said, "from my military secre- 
tary." 

"Read it, read it," cried the company. 

''Come back home right away," read out the 
Negro President, word by word. "Everything 
is all right again. Joint British and American 
Naval Squadron came into harbour yesterday, 
landed fifty bluejackets and one midshipman. 
Perfect order. Banks open. Bars open. Mule 
cars all running again. Things fine. Going to 
have big dance at your palace. Come right 
back." 

The Negro President paused. 

"Gentlemen," he said, in a voice of great 
and deep relief. "This lets me out. I guess 
I won't stay for the rest of the discussion. I'll 
start for Haiti. I reckon there's something in 
this Armed Force business after all." 



119 



V. — The White House from 
Without In 



Being Extracts from the Diary of a Presi- 
dent of the United States. 

MONDAY. Rose early. Swept out 
the White House. Cooked break- 
fast. Prayers. Sat in the garden 
reading my book on Congres- 
sional Government, What a wonderful thing 
it is! Why doesn't Congress live up to it? 
Certainly a lovely morning. Sat for some time 
thinking how beautiful the world is. I defy 
any one to make a better. Afterwards deter- 
mined to utter this defiance publicly and fear- 
lessly. Shall put in list of fearless defiances 
for July speeches. Shall probably use it in 
Oklahoma. 

9.30 A. M. Bad news. British ship Torpid 
torpedoed by a torpedo. Tense atmosphere all 
120 



Peace, War, and Politics 



over Washington. Retreated Instantly to the 
pigeonhouse and shut the door. I must think. 
At all costs. And no one shall hurry me. 

10 A. M. Have thought. Came out of 
pigeonhouse. It Is all right. I wonder I 
didn't think of It sooner. The point Is per- 
fectly simple. If Admiral TIrpItz torpedoed 
the Torpid with a torpedo, where's the tor- 
pedo Admiral TIrpItz torped? In other words, 
how do they know It's a torpedo? The Idea 
seems absolutely overwhelming. Wrote notes 
at once to England and to Germany. 

11 A. M. Gave out my Idea to the Ass 
Press. Tense feeling at Washington vanished 
instantly and utterly. Feeling now loose. In 
fact everything splendid. Money became easy 
at once. Marks rose. Exports jumped. Gold 
reserve swelled. 

3 P. M. Slightly bad news. Appears there 
is trouble in the Island of Piccolo Domingo. 
Looked it up on map. Is one of the smaller 
West Indies. We don't own it. I Imagine 
Roosevelt must have overlooked It. An Amer- 
ican has been in trouble there: was refused a 

121 



Further Foolishness 



drink after closing time and burnt down saloon. 
Is now in jail. Shall send at once our latest 
battleship — The Woodrow — new design, both 
ends alike, escorted by double-ended coal barges 
The Wilson, The President, The Professor and 
The Thinker. Shall take firm stand on Ameri- 
can rights. Piccolo Domingo must either sur- 
render the American alive, or give him to us 
dead. 

TUESDAY. A lovely day. Rose early. 
Put flowers in all the vases. Laid a wreath of 
early japonica beside my egg-cup on the break- 
fast table. Cabinet to morning prayers and 
breakfast. Prayed for better guidance. 

9 A. M. Trouble, bad trouble. First of all 
Roosevelt has an interview in the morning pa- 
pers in which he asks why I don't treat Ger- 
many as I treat Piccolo Domingo. Now, what 
a fool question! Can't he see why? Roose- 
velt never could reason. Bryan also has an in- 
terview: wants to know why I don't treat Pic- 
colo Domingo as I treat Germany? Doesn't 
he know why? 

122 



Peace, War, and Politics 



Result: strained feeling in Washington. 
Morning mail bad. 

10 A.M. British Admiralty communication. 
To the pigeonhouse at once. They offer to 
send piece of torpedo, fragment of ship and 
selected portions of dead American citizens. 

Have come out of pigeonhouse. Have ca- 
bled back: How do they know it is a torpedo, 
how do they know it is a fragment, how do 
they know he was an American, who said he 
was dead? 

My answer has helped. Feeling in Wash- 
ington easier at once. General buoyancy. 
Loans and discounts doubled. 

As I expected — a note from Germany. 
Chancellor very explicit. Says not only did 
they not torpedo the Torpid, but that on the 
day (whenever it was) that the steamer was 
torpedoed they had no submarines at sea, no 
torpedoes in their submarines, and nothing 
really explosive in their torpedoes. Offers, 
very kindly, to fill in the date of his sworn 
statement as soon as we furnish accurate date 
of incident. Adds that his own theory is that 
123 



Further Foolishness 



the Torpid was sunk by somebody throwing 
rocks at it from the shore. Wish, somehow, 
that he had not added this argument. 

More bad news: Further trouble in Mex- 
ico. Appears General Villa is not dead. He 
has again crossed the border, shot up a saloon 
and retreated to the mountains of Huahuapax- 
tapetl. Have issued instructions to have the 
place looked up on the map and send the whole 
army to it, but without in any way violating 
the neutrality of Mexico, 

Late cables from England. Two more ships 
torpedoed. American passenger lost. Name 
of Roosevelt. Christian name not Theodore 
but William. Cabled expression of regret. 

WEDNESDAY. Rose sad at heart. Did 
not work in garden. Tried to weed a little 
grass along the paths but simply couldn't. 
This is a cruel job. How was it that Roose- 
velt grew stout on it? His nature must be 
different from mine. What a miserable nature 
he must have. 

Received delegations. From Kansas, on the 
prospect of the corn crop : they said the number 
124 



Peace, War, and Politics 



of hogs In Kansas will double. Congratulated 
them. From Idaho, on the blight on the root 
crop : they say there will soon not be a hog left 
In Idaho. Expressed my sorrow. From Michi- 
gan: beet sugar growers urging a higher per- 
centage of sugar in beets. Took firm ground: 
said I stand where I stood and I stood where 
I stand. They went away dazzled, delighted. 

Mail and Telegrams. British Admiralty. 
Torpid Incident. Send further samples. Frag- 
ment of valise, parts of cow-hide trunk (dead 
passenger's luggage) which, they say, could not 
have been made except In Nevada. 

Cabled that the Incident is closed and that 
I stand where I stood and that I am what I am. 
Situation In Washington relieved at once. Gen- 
eral feeling that I shall not make war. 

Second Cable from England. The Two New 
Cases. Claim both ships torpedoed. Offer 
proofs. Situation very grave. Feeling in 
Washington very tense. Roosevelt out with a 
signed statement, What Will the President Do? 
Surely he knows what I will do. 

Cables from Germany. Chancellor now 
125 



Further Foolishness 



positive as to Torpid. Sworn evidence that 
she was sunk by some one throwing a rock. 
Sample of rock to follow. Communication also 
from Germany regarding the New Cases. 
Draws attention to fact that all of the crews 
who were not drowned were saved. An im- 
portant point. Assures this government that 
everything ascertainable will be ascertained, 
but that pending juridical verification any im- 
perial exemplification must be held categorically 
allegorical. How well these Germans write ! 

THURSDAY. A dull morning. Up early 
and read Congressional Government. Break- 
fast. Prayers. We prayed for the United 
States, for the citizens, for the Congress (both 
houses, especially the Senate), and for the 
Cabinet. Is there any one else? 

Trouble, Accident to naval flotilla en route 
to Piccolo Domingo. The new battleship The 
Woodrow has broken down. Fault In struc- 
ture. Tried to go with both ends first. Ap- 
peared Impossible. Went sideways a little and 
Is sinking. Wireless from the barges The JVil- 
son, The Thinker and others. They are stand- 
126 



Peace, War, and Politics 



ing by. They wire that they will continue to 
stand by. Why on earth do they do that? 
Shall cable to them to act. 

Feeling in Washington gloomy. 

FRIDAY. Rose early and tried to sweep 
out the White House. Had little heart for It. 
The dust gathers in the corners. How did 
Roosevelt manage to keep it so clean? An 
idea! I must get a vacuum cleaner! But 
where can I get a vacuum? Took my head 
in my hands and thought : problem solved. Can 
get the vacuum all right. 

Good news. Villa dead again. Feeling in 
Washington relieved. 

Trouble. Ship torpedoed. News just came 
from the French Government. Full rigged 
ship, The Ping-Yan, sailing out of Ping Pong, 
French Cochin China, and cleared for Hoo- 
Ra, Indo-Arabia. No American citizens on 
board, but one American citizen with ticket left 
behind on wharf at Ping Pong. Claims dam- 
ages. Complicated case. Feeling in Washing- 
ton much disturbed. Sterling exchange fell and 
wouldn't get up. French Admiralty urge treaty 
127 



Further Foolishness 



of 1778. German Chancellor admits torpedo- 
ing ship but denies that it was full rigged. Cap- 
tain of submarine drew picture of ship as it 
sank. His picture unlike any known ship of 
French navy. 

SATURDAY. A day of trouble. Villa 
came to life and crossed the border. Our army 
looking for him in Mexico : inquiry by wire — 
"Are they authorised to come back?" General 
Carranza asks leave to invade Canada. Pic- 
colo Domingo expedition has failed. The 
Woodrow is still sinking. The President and 
The Thinker cable that they are still standing 
by and will continue to stand where they have 
stood. British Admiralty sending shipload 
of fragments. German Admiralty sending ship- 
load of affidavits. Feeling In Washington de- 
pressed to the lowest depths. Sterling sink- 
ing. Marks falling. Exports dwindling. 

An idea : Is this job worth while ? I wonder 
if Billy Sunday would take it? 

Spent the evening watering the crocuses. 
Whoever is here a year from now is welcome 
128 



Peace, War, and Politics 



to them. They tell me that Hughes hates cro- 
cuses. Watered them very carefully. 

SUNDAY. Good news! Just heard from 
Princeton University. I am to come back, and 
everything will be forgiven and forgotten. 



129 



MOVIES 4 MOTORS, 

MEN <% WOMEN 



VI. — Madeline of the Movies— 

A Photoplay Done Back Into the Words 

(Explanatory Note — In writing this I 
ought to explain that I am a tottering old man 
of forty-six. I was born too soon to understand 
moving pictures. They go too fast. I can't 
keep up. In my young days we used a magic 
lantern. It showed Robinson Crusoe in six 
scenes. It took all evening to show them. 
When it was done the hall was filled with 
black smoke and the audience quite unstrung 
with excitement. What I set down here repre- 
sents my thoughts as I sit in front of a moving 
picture photoplay and interpret it as best I can.) 

FLICK, flick, flick ... I guess it must 
be going to begin now, but it's queer 
the people don't stop talking: how can 
they expect to hear the pictures if they 
go on talking? 



Further Foolishness 



Now It's off. Passed by the Board of 
— . Ah, this looks interesting — passed by 



the board of — wait till I adjust my spectacles 
and read what it 

It's gone. Never mind, here's something 
else, let me see — Cast of Characters — Oh, 
yes — let's see who they are — Madeline 
Meadowlark, a young something — Edward 
Dangerfield, a — a what? Ah, yes, a roo — 
at least, it's spelt r-o-u-e, that must be roo all 
right — But wait till I see what that is that's 
written across the top — Madeline Meadow- 
lark, OR, Alone in a Great City. I see, 
that's the title of it. I wonder which of the 
characters is alone. I guess not Madeline: 
she'd hardly be alone in a place like that. I 
imagine it's more likely Edward Dangerous 
the Roo. A roo would probably be alone a 
great deal, I should think. Let's see what the 
other characters are — John Holdfast, a 
something; Farmer Meadowlark, Mrs. 
Meadowlark, his something 

Pshaw, I missed the others, but never mind; 
flick, flick, it's beginning — ^What's this? A bed- 
134 



Movies (§ Motors^ Men <| Women 

room, eh ! Looks like a girl's bedroom — ^pretty 
poor sort of place. I wish the picture would 
keep still a minute — in Robinson Crusoe it all 
stayed still and one could sit and look at it, 
the blue sea and the green palm trees and the 
black footprints in the yellow sand — ^but this 
blamed thing keeps rippling and flickering all 
the time — Ha ! there's the girl herself — 
come into her bedroom. My! I hope she 
doesn't start to undress in it — that would be 
fearfully uncomfortable with all these people 
here. No, she's not undressing — she's gone 
and opened the cupboard. What's that she's 
doing — taking out a milk jug and a glass — 
empty, eh? I guess it must be, because she 
seemed to hold it upside down. Now she's 
picked up a sugar bowl — empty, too, eh? — and 
a cake tin, and that's empty — What on earth 
does she take them all out for if they're empty? 
Why can't she speak? I think — hullo — who's 
this coming in? Pretty hard looking sort of 
woman — what's she got in her hand? — some 
sort of paper, I guess — she looks like a land- 
lady, I shouldn't wonder if . . . 
135 



Further Foolishness 



Flick, flick ! Say ! Look there on the screen; 



YOU OWE ME THREE WEEKS' 
RENT. 



Oh, I catch on! That's what the landlady- 
says, eh? Say! that's a mighty smart way to 
indicate it, isn't it? I was on to that in a min- 
ute — flick, flick — hullo, the landlady's vanished 
— what's the girl doing now — say, she's pray- 
ing! Look at her face ! Doesn't she look re- 
ligious, eh? 

Flick, flick! 

Oh, look, they've put her face, all by itself, 
on the screen. My ! what a big face she's got 
when you see it like that. 

She's in her room again — she's taking off 
her jacket — by Gee! She is going to bed! 

Here, stop the machine ; , it doesn't seem 

-J'lick, flick! 

Well, look at that ! She's in bed, all in one 

flick, and fast asleep! Something must have 

broken in the machine and missed out a chunk. 

There! she's asleep all right — looks as if she 

136 



Movies 4 Motors, Men (| Women 

was dreaming. Now it's sort of fading. I won- 
der how they make it do that? I guess they 
turn the wick of the lamp down low: that was 

the way in Robinson Crusoe Flick, flick! 

Hullo ! where on earth is this — farmhouse, 
I guess — must be away upstate somewhere — 
who on earth are these people? Old man — 
white whiskers — old lady at a spinning-wheel 
— see it go, eh? Just like real! And a young 
man — that must be John Holdfast — and a girl 
with her hand in his. Why ! Say ! it's the girl, 
the same girl, Madeline — only what's she do- 
ing away off here at this farm — how did she 
get clean back from the bedroom to this farm? 
Flick, flick! What's this. 



NO, JOHN, I CANNOT MARRY YOU. 
I MUST DEVOTE MY LIFE 
TO MY MUSIC. 



Who says that? What music? Here, 
stop 

It's all gonq. What's this new place? Flick, 
flick, looks like a street. Say! see the street- 
137 



Further Foolishness 



car coming along — well! say! isn't that great? 
A street-car! And here's Madeline. How on 
earth did she get back from the old farm all 
in a second? Got her street things on — that 
must be music under her arm — I wonder where 
— hullo — who's this man in a silk hat and swell 
coat? Gee ! he's well dressed. See him roll his 
eyes at Madeline! He's lifting his hat — I 
guess he must be Edward Something, the Roo — 
only a roo could dress as well as he does — 
he's going to speak to her 



SIR, I DO NOT KNOW YOU. LET 
ME PASS 



Oh, I see ! The Roo mistook her ; he thought 
she was somebody that he knew ! And she 
wasn't! I catch on! It gets easy to under- 
stand these pictures once you're on. 

Flick, flick Oh, say, stop ! I missed a 

piece — where is she? Outside a street door — 

she's pausing a moment outside — that was lucky 

her pausing like that — it just gave me time to 

138 



Movies <| Motors, Men <§ Women 



read EMPLOYMENT BUREAU on the 
door. Gee! I read it quick. 

Flick, flick! Where is it now? — oh, I see, 
she's gone in — she's in there — this must be the 
Bureau, eh? There's Madeline going up to a 
desk. 



NO, WE HAVE TOLD YOU BEFORE 
WE HAVE NOTHING . . . 



Pshaw ! I read too slow — she's on the street 
again. Flick, flick! 

No, she isn't — she's back in her room — cup- 
board still empty — no milk — no sugar 

Flick, flick! 

Kneeling down to pray — my! but she's re- 
ligious — flick, flick — now she's on the street — 
got a letter in her hand — what's the ad- 
dress Flick, flick! 






139 



Further Foolishness 



Gee I They've put it right on the screen! 
The whole letter! 

Flick, flick — here's Madeline again on the 
street with the letter still in her hand — she's 
gone to a letter box with it — why doesn't she 
post it? What's stopping her? 



I CANNOT TELL THEM OF MY 

FAILURE. IT WOULD 

BREAK THEIR . . . 



Break their what? They slide these things 
along altogether too quick — anyway, she won't 

post it — I see — she's torn it up Flick, 

flick! 

Where is it now? Another street — seems 
like evening — that's a restaurant, I guess 
— say, it looks a swell place — see the people 
getting out of the motor and going in — and 
another lot right after them — there's Made- 
line — she's stopped outside the window — she's 
looking in — it's starting to snow! Hullo! 
here's a man coming along! Why, it's the Roo; 
140 



Movies &, Motors, Men ^ Women 

he's stopping to talk to her, and pointing in 
at the restaurant Flick, flick! 



LET ME TAKE YOU IN HERE TO 
DINNER. 



Oh, I see! The Roo says that! My! I'm 
getting on to the scheme of these things — the 
Roo is going to buy her some dinner 1 That's 
decent of him. He must have heard about her 
being hungry up in her room — say, I'm glad 
he came along. Look, there's a waiter come 
out to the door to show them in — what! she 
won't go! Say! I don't understand! Didn't 
it say he offered to take her in? Fhck, flick! 



I WOULD RATHER DIE THAN EAT 
IT. 



Gee! Why's that? What are all the audi- 
ence applauding for? I must have missed 
something! Fhck, flick! 

Oh, blazes! I'm getting lost! Where is 
141 



Further Foolishness 



she now? Back In her room — flick, flick — 
praying — flick, flick ! She's out on the street ! — 
flick, flick! — in the employment bureau — flick, 
flick! — out of it — flick — darn the thing! It 
changes too much — where is it all? What is it 

all ? Flirk, flick! 

Now it's back at the old farm — I under- 
stand that all right, anyway! Same kitchen 
— same old man — same old woman — she's 
crying — ^who's this? — ^man in a sort of uni- 
form — oh, I see, rural postal delivery — oh, 
yes, he brings them their letters — I see 



NO, MR. MEADOWLARK, I AM 

SORRY, I HAVE STILL NO 

LETTER FOR YOU . . . 



Flick! It's gone! Flick, flick— it's Made- 
line's room again — what's she doing? — writing 
a letter? — no, she's quit writing — she's tearing 
it up 



I CANNOT WRITE. IT WOULD 
BREAK THEIR . . . 



142 



Movies (§ Motors, Men 4 Women 

Flick — missed It again! Break their some- 
thing or other Flick, flick! 

Now It's the farm again — oh, yes, that's the 
young man John Holdfast — he's got a valise 
in his hand — he must be going away — they're 
shaking hands with him — he's saying some- 
thing 



I WILL FIND HER FOR YOU IF 
HAVE TO SEARCH ALL 
NEW YORK. 



He's off — there he goes through the gate — 
they're waving good-bye — flick — it's a railway 
depot — flick — it's New York — say! That's 
the Grand Central Depot! See the people buy- 
ing tickets ! My ! Isn't it life-like ? — and there's 
John — he's got here all right — I hope he finds 
her room 

The picture's changed — where Is it now? 
Oh, yes, I see — Madeline and the Roo — out- 
side a street entrance to some place — he's try- 
ing to get her to come In — what's that on the 

door? Oh, yes, dance hall Flick, flick! 

143 



Further Foolishness 



Well, say, that must be the inside of the 
dance hall — they're dancing — see, look, look, 
there's one of the girls going to get up and 
dance on the table. 

Flick ! Darn it ! — they've cut it off — it's out- 
side again — it's Madeline and the Roo — she's 
saying something to him — my ! doesn't sheAlqok 
proud ? 



I WILL DIE RATHER THAN DANCE. 



Isn't she splendid! Hear the audience ap- 
plaud! Flick — it's changed — it's Madeline's 
room again — that's the landlady — doesn't she 
look hard, eh? What's this Flick! 



IF YOU CANNOT PAY YOU MUST 
LEAVE TO-NIGHT. 



Flick, flick — it's Madeline — she's out in the 
street — it's snowing — she's sat down on a door- 
step — say, see her face, isn't it pathetic? 
144 



Movies (| Motors, Men 8^ Women 

There ! they've put her face all by itself on the 
screen. See her eyes move! Flick, flick! 

Who's this? Where is it? Oh, yes, I get 
it — it's John — at a police station — he's ques- 
tioning them — how grave they look, eh ? Flick, 
flick! 



HAVE YOU SEEN A GIRL IN NEW 
YORK? 



I guess that's what he asks them, eh? Flick, 
flick 



NO, WE HAVE NOT. 



Too bad — flick — it's changed again — it's 
Madeline on the doorstep — she's fallen asleep 
— oh, say, look at that man coming near to 
her on tiptoes, and peeking at her — why, it's 
Edward, it's the Roo — but he doesn't waken 
her — what does it mean? What's he after? 
Flick, flick 

Hullo — what's this? — it's night — what's this 
145 



Further Foolishness 



huge dark thing all steel, with great ropes 
against the sky — it's Brooklyn Bridge — at mid- 
night — there's a woman on it! It's Madeline 
— see! see! She's going to jump — stop her! 
Stop her! Flick, flick 

Hullo ! she didn't jump after all — there she 
is again on the doorstep — asleep — how could 
she jump over Brooklyn Bridge and still be 
asleep ? — I don't catch on — or, oh, yes, I do — 
she dreamed it — I see now, that's a great 
scheme, eh? — shows her dream 

The picture's changed — what's this place — a 
saloon, I guess — ^yes, there's the bartender, 
mixing drinks — men talking at little tables — 
aren't they a tough-looking lot? — see, that one's 
got a rejvolver — why, it's Edward the Roo — 
talking with two men — he's giving them money 
— what's this? 



GIVE US A HUNDRED APIECE AND 
WE'LL DO IT. 



It's in the street again — Edward and one 
of the two toughs — they've got little black 
146 



Movies &, Motors, Men S^ Women 

masks on — they're sneaking up to Madeline 
where she sleeps — they've got a big motor 
drawn up beside them — look, they've grabbed 
hold of Madeline — they're lifting her into the 
motor — help ! Stop ! Aren't there any police ? 
— yes, yes, there's a man who sees it — by Gee ! 
It's John, John Holdfast — grab them, John — 
pshaw ! they've jumped into the motor, they're 
off! 

Where is it now? — oh, yes — it's the police 
station again — that's John; he's telling them 
about it — he's all out of breath — look, that 
head man, the big fellow, he's giving or- 
ders 



INSPECTOR FORDYCE, TAKE YOUR 

BIGGEST CAR AND TEN MEN. 

IF YOU OVERTAKE THEM, 

SHOOT AND SHOOT 

TO KILL. 



Hoorah! Isn't it great — hurry! don't lose 
a minute — see them all buckling on revolvers 
— get at it, boys, get at it! Don't lose a sec- 
ond 

147 



Further Foolishness 



Look, look — it's a motor — full speed down 
the street — look at the houses fly past — it's the 
motor with the thugs — there it goes round the 
corner — it's getting smaller, it's getting smaller, 
but look, here comes another — my! it's just 
flying — it's full of police — there's John in 
front Flick ! 

Now it's the first motor — it's going over a 
bridge — it's heading for the country — say, isn't 
that car just flying Flick, flick! 

It's the second motor — it's crossing the 

bridge too — hurry, boys, make it go! 

Flick, flick! 

Out in the country — a country road — early 
daylight — see the wind in the trees ! Notice 
the branches waving? Isn't it natural? — whiz ! 
Biff! There goes the motor — biff! There 
goes the other one — right after it — hoorah ! 

The open road again — the first motor fly- 
ing along! Hullo, what's wrong? It's slack- 
ened, it stops — hoorah! it's broken down — 
there's Madeline inside — there's Edward the 
Roo! Say! isn't he pale and desperate! 

Hoorah ! the police ! the police ! all ten of 
148 



Movies (§ Motors, Men ^ Women 

them in their big car — see them jumping out 
— see them pile into the thugs ! Down with 
them! paste their heads off! Shoot them! 
Kill them! isn't it great — isn't it educative — 
that's the Roo — Edward — with John at his 
throat ! Choke him, John ! Throttle him ! 

Hullo, it's changed — they're in the big mo- 
tor — that's the Roo with the handcuffs on him. 

That's Madehne — she's unbound and she's 
talking; say, isn't she just real pretty when she 
smiles? 



YES, JOHN, I HAVE LEARNED 

THAT I WAS WRONG TO PUT 

MY ART BEFORE YOUR LOVE. 

I WILL MARRY YOU AS 

SOON AS YOU LIKE. 



Flick, flick! 

What pretty music! Ding! Dong! Ding! 
Dong ! Isn't it soft and sweet ! — like wedding 
bells. Oh, I see, the man in the orchestra's 
doing it with a little triangle and a stick — 
it's a little church up in the country — see all 
149 



Further Foolishness 



the people lined up — oh ! there's Madeline ! in 
a long white veil — isn't she just sweet! — and 
John 



Flick, flack, flick, flack. 



BULGARIAN TROOPS ON THE 
MARCH. 



What! Isn't it over? Do they all go to 
Bulgaria? I don't seem to understand. Any- 
way, I guess it's all right to go now. Other 
people are going. 



I 'JO 



VII.—The Call of the Carbureter 

or 

Mr. Blinks and His Friends 



{"First get a motor in your own eye and 
then you will overlook more easily the motor 
in your brother's eye." — Somewhere in the 
Bible.) 

BY all means let's have a reception," said 
Mrs. Blinks. "It's the quickest and 
nicest way to meet our old friends 
again after all these years. And good- 
ness knows this house is big enough for it" — 
she gave a glance, as she spoke, round the big 
reception room of the Blinks' residence — "and 
these servants seem to understand things so 
perfectly it's no trouble to us to give any- 
thing. Only don't let's ask a whole lot of chat- 
tering young people that we don't know; let's 
151 



Further Foolishness 



have the older people, the ones that can talk 
about something really worth while." 

"That's just what I say," answered Mr. 
Blinks — he was a small man with insignificance 
written all over him — "let me listen to people 
talk; that's what / like. I'm not much on the 
social side myself, but I do enjoy hearing good 
talk. That's what I liked so much over in 
England. All them — all those people that we 
used to meet talked so well. And in France 
those ladies that run saloons on Sunday after- 
noons " 

"Sallongs," corrected Mrs. Blinks. "It's 
sounded like it was a G." She picked up a 
pencil and paper. 

"Well, then," she said, as she began to write 
down names, "we'll ask Judge Ponderus " 

"Sure!" assented Mr. Blinks, rubbing his 
hands. "He's a fine talker, if he'll come!" 

"They'll all come," said his wife, "to a house 
as big as this; and we'll ask the Rev. Dr. Domb 
and his wife — or, no, he's Archdeacon Domb 
now, I hear — and we'll invite Bishop SoUem, 
so they can talk together." 
152 



3Iovies S^ Motors, Men ^ Women 

'That'll be good," said Mr. Blinks. "I re- 
member years and years ago hearing them two 
— those two, talking about religion, all about 
the soul and the body. Man ! It was deep. It 
was clean beyond me. That's what I like to 
listen to." 

"And Professor Potofax from the college," 
went on Mrs. Blinks. "You remember, the big 
stout one." 

"I know," said her husband. 

" — and his daughter, she's musical, and Mrs. 
Buncomtalk, she's a great light on woman suf- 
frage, and Miss Scragg and Mr. Underdone — 
they both write poetry, so they can talk about 
that." 

"It'll be a great treat to listen to them all," 
said Mr. BHnks. 

A week later, on the day of the Blinks' re- 
ception, there was a string of motors three deep 
along a line of a hundred yards in front of 
the house. 

Inside the reception rooms were filled. 



Further Foolishness 



Mr. Blinks, Insignificant even In his own 
house, moved to and fro among his guests. 

Archdeacon Domb and Dean Sollem were 
standing side by side with their heads gravely 
lowered as they talked over the cups of tea 
that they held in their hands. 

Mr. Blinks edged towards them. "This'll 
be something pretty good," he murmured to 
himself as he got within reach of their con- 
versation. 

"What do you do about your body?" the 
Archdeacon was asking in his deep, solemn 
tones. 

"Practically nothing," said the Bishop. "A 
little rub of shellac now and then, but practi- 
cally nothing." 

"You wash it, of course?" asked Dr. Domb. 

"Only now and again, but far less than you 
would think. I really take very little thought 
for my body." 

"Ah," said Dr. Domb, reflectively, "I went 

all over mine last summer with linseed oil." 

" "But didn't you find," said the Bishop, "that 

it got into your pipes and choked your feed?" 

154 



Movies S^ Motors, Men ^ Women 

"It did," said Dr. Domb, munching a bit 
of toast as he spoke. "In fact, I have had a 
lot of trouble with my feed ever since." 

"Try flushing your pipes out with hot 
steam," said the Bishop. 

Mr. Blinks had listened in something like 
dismay. "Motor cars !" he murmured. "Who'd 
have thought it?" 

But at this moment a genial, hearty-looking 
person came pushing towards him with a cheery 
greeting. 

"Im afraid I'm rather late, Blinks," he said. 

"Delayed in court, eh, Judge?" said Blinks 
as he shook hands. 

"No, blew out a plug!" said the Judge. 
"Stalled me right up." 

"Blew out a plug!" exclaimed Dr. Domb and 
the Bishop, deeply interested at once. 

"A cracked insulator, I think," said the 
Judge. 

"Possibly," said the Archdeacon, very grave- 
ly, "the terminal nuts of your dry battery were 
loose." 

IS5 



Further Foolishness 



Mr. Blinks moved slowly away. "Dear 
me!" he mused, "how changed they are." 

It was a relief to him to edge his way quietly 
into another group of guests where he felt cer- 
tain that the talk would be of quite another 
kind. 

Professor Potofax and Miss Snagg and a 
number of others were evidently talking about 
books. 

"A beautiful book," the professor was say- 
ing. "One of the best things, to my mind at 
any rate, that has appeared for years. There's 
a chapter on the silencing of exhaust gas which 
is simply marvellous." 

"Is it illustrated?" questioned one of the 
ladies. 

"Splendidly," said the professor. "Among 
other things there are sectional views of check 
valves and flexible roller bearings " 

"Ah, do tell me about the flexible bearings," 
murmured Miss Snaggs. 

Mr. Blinks moved on. 

Wherever he went among his guests, they 
156 



Movies <§ Motors^ Men ^ Women 

all seemed stricken with the same mania. He 
caught their conversation in little scraps. 

"I ran her up to forty with the greatest ease, 
then threw in my high speed and got seventy out 
of her without any trouble." — "No, I simply 
used a socket wrench, it answers perfectly." — 
"Yes, a solution of calcium chloride is very 
good, but of course the hydrochloric acid in 
it has a powerful effect on the metal." 

"Dear me !" mused Mr. Blinks, "are they all 
mad?" 

Meantime, around his wife, who stood re- 
ceiving in state at one end of the room, the 
guests surged to and fro. 

"So charmed to see you again," exclaimed 
one. "You've been in Europe a long time, 
haven't you? Oh, mostly in the south of Eng- 
land? Are the roads good? Last year my 
husband and I went all through Shakespeare's 
country. It's just delightful. They sprinkle it 
so thoroughly. And Stratford-on-Avon itself 
is just a treat. It's all oiled, every bit of it — 
except the little road by Shakespeare's house — 
but we didn't go along that. Then later we 
157 



Further Foolishness 



went up to the Lake District: but It's not so 
good: they don't oil It." 

She floated away, to give place to another 
lady. 

"In France every summer?" she exclaimed. 
"Oh, how perfectly lovely. Don't you think 
the French cars simply divine? My husband 
thinks the French body Is far better modelled 
than ours. He saw ever so many of them. He 
thought of bringing one over with him, but it 
costs such a lot to keep them In good or- 
der." . . . 

"The theatres?" said another lady. "How 
you must have enjoyed them. I just love the 
theatres. Last week my husband and I were 
at the Palatial — It's moving pictures — where 
they have that film with the motor collision 
running. It's just wonderful. You see the 
motors going at full speed, and then smash 
right Into one another — and all the people 
killed — It's really fine." 

"Have they all gone Insane?" said Mr. 
Blinks to his wife after the guests had gone. 
158 



Movies (| Motors, Men 8^ Women 

"Dreadful, isn't It?" she assented. "I never 
was so bored in my life." 

"Why! they talk of nothing else but their 
motor cars," said Blinks. "We've got to get a 
car, I suppose, living at this distance from the 
town, but I'm hanged if I intend to go clean 
crazy over it like these people." 

And the guests as they went home talked of 
the Blinkses. 

"I fear," said Dr. Domb to Judge Ponderus, 
"that Blinks has hardly profited by his time 
in Europe as much as he ought to have. He 
seems to have observed nothing. I was ask- 
ing him about the new Italian touring car that 
they are using so much in Rome. He said he 
had never noticed it. And he was there a 
month!" 

"Is it possible?" said the Judge. "Where 
were his eyes?" 

All of which showed that Mr. and Mrs. 
Blinks were in danger of losing therr friends 
for ever. 

159 



Further Foolishness 



But it so happened that about three weeks 
later Blinks came home to his residence in an 
obvious state of excitement. His face was 
flushed and he had on a silly little round cap 
with a glazed peak. 

"Why, Clarence!" cried his wife, "whatever 
is the matter?" 

"Matter!" he exclaimed. "There isn't any- 
thing the matter! I bought a car this morning, 
that's all. Say, it's a beauty, a regular peach, 
four thousand with ten off, I ran it clean 
round the shed alone first time. The chauf- 
feur says he never saw anybody get on to the 
hang of it so quick. Get on your hat and come 
right on down to the garage. I've got a man 
waiting there to teach you to run it. Hurry 
up!" 

Within a week or two after that one might 
see the Blinkses any morning, in fact every 
morning, out in their car! 

"Good morning. Judge !" calls Blinks gaily as 
he passes. "How's that carbureter acting? — 
Good morning. Archdeacon, is that plug trouble 
1 60 



Movies <% Motors, Men S^ Women 

of yours all right again? — Hullo ! professor, let 
me pick you up and ride you up to the col- 
lege; oh, it's no trouble. What do you think 
of the bearings of this car? Aren't they just 
dandy?" 

And so Mr. Blinks has got all his friends 
back again. 

After all, the great thing about being crazy 
is to be all crazy together. 



161 



VIII— The Two Sexes, In Fives 
or Sixes — A Dinner Party Study. 

BUT, surely!" exclaimed the Hostess, 
looking defiantly and searchingly 
through the cut flowers of the centre- 
piece, so that her eye could intimidate 
in turn all the five men at the table, "one must 
admit that women are men^s equals in every 
way?" 

The Lady-with-the-Bust tossed her head a 
little and echoed, "Oh, surely!" 

The Debutante lifted her big blue eyes a lit- 
tle towards the ceiling, with the upward glance 
that stands for innocence. She said nothing, 
waiting for a cue as to what to appear to be. 
Meantime the Chief Lady Guest, known to 
be in suffrage work, was pinching up her lips 
and getting her phrases ready, like a harpooner 
waiting to strike. She knew that the Hostess 
meant this as an opening for her. 
162 



Movies (| Motors, Men (§ Women 

But the Soft Lady Whom Men Like toyed 
with a bit of bread on the tablecloth (she had 
a beautiful hand) and smiled gently. The other 
women would have called it a simper. To the 
men it stood for profound intelligence. 

The five men that sat amongst and between 
the ladies received the challenge of the Hos- 
tess's speech and answered it each in his own 
way. 

From the Heavy Host at the head of the 
table there came a kind of deep grunt, nothing 
more. He had heard this same talk at each of 
his dinners that season. 

There was a similar grunt from the Heavy 
Business Friend of the Host, almost as broad 
and thick as the host himself. He knew too 
what was coming. He proposed to stand by 
his friend, man for man. He could sympathise. 
The Lady-with-the-Bust was his wife. 

But the Half Man with the Moon Face, 
who was known to work side by side with 
women on committees and who called them 
"Comrades," echoed, "Oh, surely!" with deep 
emphasis. 

'63 



Further Foolishness 



The Smooth Gentleman, there for busi- 
ness reasons, exclaimed with great alacrity, 
"Women equal! Oh, rather!" 

Last of all the Interesting Man with Long 
Hair, known to write for the magazines — all 
of them — began at once, "I remember once say- 
ing to Mrs. Pankhurst " but was over- 
whelmed in the general conversation before he 
could say what it was he remembered saying 
to Mrs. Pankhurst. 

In other words, the dinner party, at about 
course number seven, had reached the inevita- 
ble moment of the discussion of the two sexes. 

It had begun as dinner parties do. 

Everybody had talked, gloomily, to his 
neighbour over the oysters on one drink of 
white wine; more or less brightly to two peo- 
ple, over the fish, on two drinks; quite bril- 
liantly to three people on three drinks; and 
then the conversation had become general and 
the European war had been fought through 
three courses with champagne. Everybody had 
taken an extremely broad point of view. The 
Heavy Business Friend had declared himself 
164 



Movies t| Motors, Men ^ Women 

absolutely impartial and had at once got wet 
with rage over cotton. The Chief Lady Guest 
had explained that she herself was half Eng- 
lish on her mother's side, and the Lady-with- 
the-Bust had told how a lady friend of hers had 
a cousin who had travelled in Hungary. She 
admitted that it was some years ago. Things 
might have changed since. Then the Interest- 
ing Man, having got the table where he wanted 
it, had said: "I remember when I was last in 
Sofia — by the way it is pronounced Say-ah-fee- 
ah — talking with Radovitch — or Radee-ah- 
vitch, as it should be sounded — the foreign sec- 
retary, on what the Sobranje — it is pronounced 
Soophrangee — would be likely to do" — and by 
the time he had done with the Sobranje no 
one dared speak of the war any more. 

But the Hostess had got out of it the open- 
ing she wanted, and she said: 

"At any rate, it is wonderful what women 
have done in the war " 

" — and are doing," echoed the Half Man 
with the Moon Face. 

And then it was that the Hostess had said 

165 



Further Foolishness 



that surely every one must admit women are 
equal to men and the topic of the sexes was 
started. All the women had been waiting for 
it, anyway. I^ is the only topic that women 
care about. Even men can stand it provided 
that fifty per cent, or more of the women pres- 
ent are handsome enough to justify it. 

"I hardly see how, after all that has hap- 
pened, any rational person could deny for a 
moment," continued the hostess, looking 
straight at her husband and his Heavy Business 
Friend, "that women are equal and even su- 
perior to men. Surely our brains are just as 
good?" and she gave an almost bitter laugh. 

"Don't you think perhaps " began the 

Smooth Gentleman. 

"No, I don't," said the Hostess. "You're 
going to say that we are inferior in things like 
mathematics or in logical reasoning. We are 
not. But, after all, the only reason why we 
are is because of training. Think of the thou- 
sands of years that men have been trained. 
Answer me that?" 

i66 



Movies <§ Motors^ Men S^ Women 

"Well, might it not be" — ^began the Smooth 
Gentleman. 

"I don't think so for a moment," said the 
Hostess. "I think if we'd only been trained as 
men have for the last two or three thousand 
years our brains would be just as well trained 
for the things they were trained for as they 
would have been now for the things we have 
been trained for and in that case wouldn't have. 
Don't you agree with me," she said, turning to 
the Chief Lady Guest, whom she suddenly re- 
membered, "that, after all, we think more 
clearly?" 

Here the Interesting Man, who had been 
silent longer than an Interesting Man can, with- 
out apoplexy, began: 

"I remember once saying in London to Sir 
Charles Doosey " 

But the Chief Lady Guest refused to be 
checked. 

"We've been gathering some rather interest- 
ing statistics," she said, speaking very firmly, 
syllable by syllable, "on that point at our Set- 
tlement. We have measured the heads of five 
167 



Further Foolishness 



hundred factory girls, making a chart of them, 
you know, and the feet of five hundred domestic 
servants " 

"And don't you find — " began the Smooth 
Gentleman. 

"No," said the Chief Lady Guest, firmly, 
"we do not. But I was going to say that when 
we take our measurements and reduce them 
to a scale of a hundred — I think you under- 
stand me " 

"Ah, but come, now," interrupted the In- 
teresting Man, "there's nothing really more de- 
ceitful than anthropometric measures. I re- 
member once saying (in London) to Sir Robert 
Bittell — the Sir Robert Bittell, you know " 

Here everybody murmured, "Oh, yes," ex- 
cept the Heavy Host and his Heavy Friend, 
who with all their sins were honest men. 

"I said: Sir Robert, I want your frank opin- 
ion, your very frank opinion " 

But here there was a slight interruption. The 

Soft Lady accidentally dropped a bangle from 

her wrist on to the floor. Now all through 

the dinner she had hardly said anything, but 

i68 



Movies (| Motors, Men 8^ Women 

she had listened for twenty minutes (from the 
grapefruit to the fish) while the Interesting 
Man had told her about his life in Honduras 
(it is pronounced Hondooras), and for an- 
other twenty while the Smooth Gentleman, who 
was a barrister, had discussed himself as a 
pleader. And when each of the men had begun 
to speak in the general conversation, she had 
looked deep into their faces as if hanging on to 
their words. So when she dropped her bangle 
two of the men leaped from their chairs to get 
it, and the other three made a sort of struggle 
as they sat. By the time it was recovered and 
replaced upon her arm (a very beautiful arm), 
the Interesting Man was sidetracked and the 
Chief Lady Guest, who had gone on talking 
during the bangle hunt, was heard saying, 

"Entirely so. That seems to me the great- 
est difficulty before us. So few men are will- 
ing to deal with the question with perfect sin- 
cerity." 

She laid emphasis on the word and the Half 
Man with the Moon Face took his cue from it 
and threw a pose of almost painful sincerity. 
169 



Further Foolishness 



"Why is it?" continued the Chief Lady 
Guest, "that men always insist on dealing with 
us just as if we were playthings, just so many 
dressed-up dolls?" 

Here the debutante immediately did a doll. 

"If a woman is attractive and beautiful," 
the lady went on, "so much the better." (She 
had no intention of letting go of the doll busi- 
ness entirely.) "But surely you men ought to 
value us as something more than mere dolls?" 

She might have pursued the topic, but at 
this moment the Smooth Gentleman, who made 
a rule of standing in all round, and had broken 
into a side conversation with the silent host, 
was overheard to say something about women's 
sense of humour. 

The table was in a turmoil in a moment, 
three of the ladies speaking at once. To deny 
a woman's sense of humour is the last form 
of social insult. 

"I entirely disagree with you," said the 

Chief Lady Guest, speaking very severely. "I 

know it from my own case, from my own sense 

of humour and from observation. Last week, 

170 



Movies <§ Motors, Men 6^ Women 

for example, we measured no less than sev- 
enty-five factory girls " 

"Well, I'm sure," said the Lady-with-the- 
Bust, "I don't know what men mean by our 
not having a sense of humour. I'm sure I have. 
I know I went last week to a vaudeville, and 
I just laughed all through. Of course I can't 
read Mark Twain, or anything like that, but 
then I don't call that funny, do you?" — she 
concluded, turning to the Hostess. 

But the Hostess, feeling somehow that the 
ground was dangerous, had already risen and 
in a moment more the ladies had floated out 
of the room and upstairs to the drawing-room, 
where they spread themselves about in easy 
chairs in billows of pretty-coloured silk. 

"How charming it is !" the Chief Lady Guest 
began, "to find men coming so entirely to our 
point of. view. Do you know it was so de- 
lightful to-night; I hardly heard a word of 
dissent or contradiction." 

Thus they talked ; except the Soft Lady, who 
had slipped into a seat by herself with an 
album over her knees, and with an empty 
171 



Further Foolishness 



chair on either side of her. There she waited. 

Meantime, down below, the men had shifted 
into chairs to one end of the table and the 
Heavy Host was shoving cigars at them, thick 
as ropes, and passing the port wine, with his 
big fist round the neck of the decanter. But 
for his success in life he could have had a 
place as a bartender anywhere. 

None of them spoke till the cigars were well 
alight. 

Then the Host said, very deliberately, tak- 
ing each word at his leisure, with smoke in 
between : 

*'Of course — this — suffrage business " 

"Tommyrot!" exclaimed the Smooth Gen- 
tleman, with great alacrity, his mask entirely 
laid aside. 

"Damn foolishness," gurgled the Heavy 
Business Friend, sipping his port. 

"Of course you can't really discuss it with 
women," murmured the Host. 

"Oh, no," assented all the others. Even 
the Half Man sipped his wine and turned 
traitor, there being no one to see. 
172 



Movies ^ Motors, Men S^ Women 

"You see," said the Host, "if my wife likes 
to go to meetings and be on committees, why, 
I don't stop her." 

"Neither do I mine," said the Heavy 
Friend. "It amuses her, so I let her do it." 
His wife, the Lady-with-the-Bust, was safely 
out of hearing. 

"I remember once," began the Interesting 
Man, "saying to" — he paused a moment, for 
the others were looking at him — "saying to an- 
other man that if women did get the vote they'd 
never use it, anyway. All they like is being 
talked about for not getting it." 

After which, having exhausted the Woman 
Question, the five men turned to such bigger 
subjects as the fall in sterling exchange and 
the President's seventeenth note to Germany. 

Then presently they went upstairs. And 
when they reached the door of the drawing- 
room a keen observer, or, indeed, any kind of 
observer, might have seen that all five of them 
made an obvious advance towards the two 
empty seats beside the Soft Lady. 



173 



IX. — The Grass Bachelor s Guide. 

With Sincere Apologies to the Ladies^ Periodicals. 

THERE are periods in the life of every 
married man when he is turned for 
the time being into a grass bachelor. 
This happens, for instance, in the 
summer time when his wife is summering by 
the sea, and he himself is simmering in the 
city. It happens also in the autumn when his 
wife is in Virginia playing golf in order to 
restore her shattered nerves after the fatigues 
of the seaside. It occurs again in November 
when his wife is in the Adirondacks to get the 
benefit of the altitude, and later on through the 
winter when she is down in Florida to get the 
benefit of the latitude. The breaking up of 
the winter being, notoriously, a trying time on 
the system, any reasonable man is apt to con- 
sent to his wife's going to California. In the 
later spring, the season of the bursting flowers 
174 



Movies (§ Motors, Men <| Women 

and the young buds, every woman likes to be 
with her mother in the country. It is not fair 
to stop her. 

It thus happens that at various times of the 
year a great number of men, unable to leave 
their business, are left to their own resources 
as housekeepers in their deserted houses and 
apartments. It is for their benefit that I have 
put together these hints on housekeeping for 
men. It may be that in composing them I owe 
something to the current numbers of the lead- 
ing women's magazines. If so, I need not 
apologise. I am sure that in these days We 
Men all feel that We Men and We Women are 
so much alike, or at least those of us who call 
ourselves so, that we need feel no jealousy 
when We Men and We Women are striving 
each, or both, in the same direction if in op- 
posite ways. I hope that I make myself clear. 
I am sure I do. 

So I feel that if We Men, who are left alone 
in our houses and apartments in the summer- 
time, would only set ourselves to it, we could 
make life not only a little brighter for our- 
175 



Further Foolishness 



selves but also a little less bright for those 
about us. 

Nothing contributes to this end so much as 
good housekeeping. The first thing for the 
housekeeper to realise is that it is impossible 
for him to attend to his housekeeping in the stiff 
and unbecoming garments of his business 
hours. When he begins his day he must there- 
fore carefully consider — 

WHAT TO WEAR BEFORE DRESSING 

The simplest and best thing will be found 
to be a plain sacque or kimono, cut very full 
so as to allow of the freest movement, and 
buttoned either down the front or back or both. 
If the sleeve is cut short at the elbow and ruf- 
fled above the bare arm, the effect is both serv- 
iceable and becoming. It will be better, espe- 
cially for such work as lighting the gas range 
and boiling water, to girdle the kimono with a 
simple yet effective rope of tasselled silk, which 
may be drawn in or let out according to the 
amount of water one wishes to boil. A simple 
176 



Movies <§ Motors, Men 8^ Women 

kimono of this sort can be bought almost any- 
where for $2,50, or can be supplied by Messrs. 
Einstein & Fickelbrot (see advertising pages) 
for twenty-five dollars. 

Having a kimono such as this, our house- 
keeper can either button himself into it with a 
button-hook (very good ones are supplied by 
Messrs. Einstein & Fickelbrot [see ad] at a 
very reasonable price or even higher) , or, bet- 
ter still, he can summon the janitor of the 
apartment, who can button him up quite se- 
curely in a few minutes' time — a quarter of an 
hour at the most. We Men cannot impress 
upon ourselves too strongly that, for efficient 
housekeeping, time is everything, and that much 
depends on quiet, effective movement from 
place to place, or from any one place to any 
number of other places. We are now ready 
to consider the all important question — 

WHAT TO SELECT FOR BREAKFAST 

Our housekeeper will naturally desire some- 
thing that is simple and easily cooked, yet at 
177 



Further Foolishness 



the same time sustaining and invigorating and 
containing a maximum of food value with a 
minimum of cost. If he is wise he will reahse 
that the food ought to contain a proper quan- 
tity of both proteids and amygdaloids, and 
while avoiding a nitrogenous breakfast, should 
see to it that he obtains sufficient of what is 
albuminous and exogamous to prevent his 
breakfast from becoming monotonous. Care- 
ful thought must therefore be given to the 
breakfast menu. 

For the purpose of thinking, a simple but 
very effective costume may be devised by throw- 
ing over the kimono itself a thin lace shawl, 
with a fichu carried high above the waistline 
and terminating in a plain insertion. A bit of 
old lace thrown over the housekeeper's head 
is at once serviceable and becoming and will 
help to keep the dust out of his brain while 
thinking what to eat for breakfast. 

Very naturally our housekeeper's first choice 

will be some kind of cereal. The simplest and 

most economical breakfast of this kind can be 

secured by selecting some cereal or grain food 

178 



Movies S^ Motors, Men 8^ Women 

— such as oats, flax, split peas that have been 
carefully strained in the colander, or beans that 
have been fired off in a gun. Any of these 
cereals may be bought for ten cents a pound at 
a grocer's — or obtained from Messrs. Einstein 
& Fickelbrot for a dollar a pound, or more. 
Supposing then that we have decided upon a 
pound of split peas as our breakfast, the next 
task that devolves upon our housekeeper is to — 

GO OUT AND BUY IT 

Here our advice is simple but positive. 
Shopping should never be done over the tele- 
phone or by telegraph. The good housekeeper 
instead of telegraphing for his food will in- 
sist on seeing his food himself, and will eat 
nothing that he does not first see before eat- 
ing. This is a cardinal rule. For the moment, 
then, the range must be turned low while our 
housekeeper sallies forth to devote himself to 
his breakfast shopping. The best costume for 
shopping is a simple but effective suit, cut in 
plain lines, either square or crosswise, and but- 
179 



Further Foolishness 



toned wherever there are button-holes. A sim- 
ple hat of some dark material may be worn 
together with plain boots drawn up well over 
the socks and either laced or left unlaced. No 
harm is done if a touch of colour is added by 
carrying a geranium in the hand. We are now 
ready for the street. 

TEST OF EFFECTIVE SHOPPING 

Here we may say at once that the crucial 
test is that we must know what we want, why 
we want it, where we want it, and what it is. 
Time, as We Men are only too apt to forget, 
is everything, and since our aim is now a pound 
of split peas we must, as we sally forth, think 
of a pound of split peas and only a pound. A 
cheery salutation may be exchanged with other 
morning shoppers as we pass along, but only 
exchanged. Split peas being for the moment 
our prime business, we must, as rapidly and un- 
obtrusively as possible, visit those shops and 
only those shops where split peas are to be had. 

Having found the split peas, our housekeep- 
i8o 



Movies (§ Motors, Men ^ Women 

er's next task is to pay for them. This he does 
with money that may be either carried in the 
hand, or, better, tucked into a simple etui, or 
dodu, that can be carried at the wrist or tied 
to the ankle. The order duly given, our house- 
keeper gives his address for the delivery of the 
peas, and then, as quietly and harmlessly as 
possible, returns to his apartment. His next 
office, and a most important one it is, is now 
ready to be performed. This new but neces- 
sary duty is — 

WAITING FOR THE DELIVERY VAN 

A good costume for waiting for a delivery 
van in, is a simple brown suit, slashed with 
yellow and purple, and sliced or gored from 
the hip to the feet. As time is everything, the 
housekeeper, after having put on his slashed 
costume for waiting for the delivery van, may 
set himself to the performance of a number of 
light household tasks, at the same time looking 
occasionally from the window so as to detect 
the arrival of the van as soon as possible after 
i8i 



Further Foolishness 



It has arrived. Among other things, he may 
now feed his canary by opening its mouth with 
a button hook and dropping in coffee beans till 
the little songster shows by its gratified air 
that it is full. A little time may be well spent 
among the flowers and bulbs of the apartment, 
clipping here a leaf and here a stem, and re- 
moving the young buds and bugs. For work 
among the flowers, a light pair of rather long 
scissors, say a foot long, can be carried at 
the girdle, or attached to the etui and passed 
over the shoulder with a looped cord so as to 
fall in an easy and graceful fold across the 
back. The moment is now approaching when 
we may expect — 

THE ARRIVAL OF THE VAN 

The housekeeper will presently discover the 
van, drawn up in front of the apartment, and 
its driver curled up on the seat. Now is the 
moment of activity. Hastily throwing on a 
peignoir, the housekeeper descends and, receiv- 
ing his parcel, re-ascends to his apartment. The 
182 



Movies (§ Motors, Men 8^ Women 

whole descent and re-ascent Is made quickly, 
quietly, and, If possible, only once. 

PUTTING THE PEAS TO SOAK 

Remember that unsoaked peas are hard, 
forcible, and surcharged with a nitrogenous 
amygdaloid that is in reality what chemical sci- 
ence calls putrate of lead. On the other hand, 
peas that are soaked become large, voluble, tex- 
tile and, while extremely palatable, are none 
the less rich In glycerine, starch, and other lac- 
teroids and bactifera. To contain the required 
elements of nutrition split peas must be soaked 
for two hours in fresh water and afterwards 
boiled for an hour and a quarter (eighty-five 
minutes). 

It is now but the work of a moment to lift 
the saucepan of peas from the fire, strain them 
through a colander, pass them thence into a 
net or bag, rinse them In cold water and then 
spread the whole appetising mass on a platter 
and carry it on a fire shovel to the dining-room. 
183 



Further Foolishness 



As It is now about six o'clock in the evening, 
our housekeeper can either — 

TELEPHONE TO HIS CLUB AND 
ORDER A THIN SOUP WITH A 

BITE OF FISH, TWO LAMB 

CHOPS WITH ASPARAGUS, AND 

SEND WORD ALSO FOR A 

PINT OF MOSELLE TO BE LAID ON 

ICE 

OR HE CAN SIT DOWN AND EAT 
THOSE D N PEAS. 

We know which he will do. 



184 



X. — Every Man and His Friends. 
Mr. Crunch's Portrait Gallery. 

{As edited from his private thoughts) 



HIS VIEWS ON HIS EMPLOYER 

A MEAN man. I say it, of course, with- 
out any prejudice, and without the 
slightest malice. But the man is 
mean. Small, I think, is the word. 
I am not thinking, of course, of my own salary. 
It is not a matter that I would care to refer to ; 
though, as a matter of fact, one would think 
that after fifteen years of work an application 
for an increase of five hundred dollars is the 
kind of thing that any man ought to be glad 
to meet half way. Not that I bear the man 
any malice for It. None. If he died to-mor- 
row, no one would regret his death as gen- 
i8s 



Further Foolishness 



uinely as I would : if he fell into the river and 
got drowned, or if he fell into a sewer and 
suffocated, or if he got burned to death in a 
gas explosion (there are a lot of things that 
might happen to him), I should feel genuinely 
sorry to see him cut off. 

But what strikes me more than the man's 
smallness is his incompetence. The man is ab- 
solutely no good. It's not a thing that I would 
say outside : as a matter of fact I deny it every 
time I hear it, though every man in town knows 
it. How that man ever got the position he has 
is more than I can tell. And as for holding 
it, he couldn't hold it half a day if it weren't 
that the rest of us in the office do practically 
everything for him. 

Why, I've seen him send out letters (I 
wouldn't say this to any one outside, of course, 
and I wouldn't like to have it repeated) — let- 
ters with, actually, mistakes in English. Think 
of it, in English! Ask his stenographer. 

I often wonder why I go on working for 
him. There are dozens of other companies 
that would give anything to get me. Only the 
i86 



Movies (| Motors, Men ^ Women 

other day — it's not ten years ago — I had an 
offer, or practically an offer, to go to Japan 
selling Bibles. I often wish now I had taken 
it. I believe I'd like the Japanese. They're 
gentlemen, the Japanese. They wouldn't turn 
a man down after slaving awq^ for fifteen 
years. 

I often think I'll quit him. I say to my wife 
that that man had better not provoke me too 
far; or some day I'll just step into his office 
and tell him exactly what I think of him. I'd 
like to. I often say it over to myself in the 
street car coming home. 

He'd better be careful, that's all. 

II 

THE MINISTER WHOSE CHURCH HE 
ATTENDS 

A dull man. Dull is the only word I can 
think of that exactly describes him — dull and 
prosy. I don't say that he is not a good man. 
He may be. I don't say that he is not. I have 
never seen any sign of it, if he is. But I make 
187 



Further Foolishness 



it a rule never to say anything to take away 
a man's character. 

And his sermons! Really that sermon he 
gave last Sunday on Esau seemed to me the 
absolute limit. I wish you could have heard 
it. I mean to say — drivel. I said to my wife 
and some friends, as we walked away from the 
church, that a sermon like that seemed to me 
to come from the dregs of the human intellect. 
Mind you, I don't believe in criticising a ser- 
mon. I always feel it a sacred obligation never 
to offer a word of criticism. When I say that 
the sermon was punk, I don't say it as criticism. 
I merely state it as a fact. And to think that 
we pay that man eighteen hundred dollars a 
year! And he's in debt all the time at that. 
What does he do with it? He can't spend it. 
It's not as if he had a large family (they've 
only four children). It's just a case of sheer 
extravagance. He runs about all the time. 
Last year it was a trip to a Synod Meeting at 
New York — away four whole days: and two 
years before that, dashing off to a Scripture 
i88 



Movies S^ Motors, Men ^ Women 

Conference at Boston, and away nearly a whole 
week, and his wife with him ! 

What I say Is that if a man's going to spend 
his time gadding about the country hke that — 
here to-day and there to-morrow — how on 
earth can he attend to his parochial duties? 

I'm a religious man. At least I trust I am. 
I believe — and more and more as I get older 
— in eternal punishment. I see the need of it 
when I look about me. As I say, I trust I am 
a religious man, but when it comes to sub- 
scribing fifty dollars, as they want us to, to 
get that man out of debt, I say "No." 

True religion, as I see it, is not connected 
with money. 

Ill 

HIS PARTNER AT BRIDGE 

The man is a complete ass. How a man 
like that has the nerve to sit down at a bridge 
table, I don't know. I wouldn't mind if the 
man had any idea — even the faintest idea — 
of how to play. But he hasn't any. Three 
189 



Further Foolishness 



times I signalled to him to throw the lead into 
my hand and he wouldn't : I knew that our only 
ghost of a chance was to let me do all the 
playing. But the ass couldn't see it. He even 
had the supreme nerve to ask me what I meant 
by leading diamonds when he had signalled 
that he had none. I couldn't help asking him, 
as politely as I could, why he had disregarded 
my signal for spades. He had the gall to ask 
in reply why I had overlooked his signal for 
clubs in the second hand round; the very time, 
mind you, when I had led a three spot as a 
sign to him to let me play the whole game. 
I couldn't help saying to him, at the end of the 
evening, in a tone of such evident satire that 
any one but an ass would have recognised 
it, that I had seldom had as keen an evening 
at cards. 

But he didn't see it. The irony of it was 
lost on him. The jackass merely said — quite 
amiably and unconsciously — that he thought I'd 
play a good game presently. Me ! Play a 
good game presently ! ! 

I gave him a look, just one look as I went 
190 



Movies ^ Motors, Men 8$ Women 

out! But I don't think he saw it. He was 
talking to some one else. 

IV 

HIS HOSTESS AT DINNER 

On what principle that woman makes up 
her dinner parties is more than human brain 
can devise. Mind you, I like going out to 
dinner. To my mind it's the very best form of 
social entertainment. But I like to find my- 
self among people that can talk, not among 
a pack of numbskulls. What I like is good 
general conversation, about things worth talk- 
ing about. But among a crowd of idiots like 
that what can you expect? You'd think that 
even society people would be interested, or pre- 
tend to be, in real things. But not a bit. I 
had hardly started to talk about the rate of ex- 
change on the German mark in relation to the 
fall of sterling bills — a thing that you would 
think a whole tableful of people would be glad 
to listen to — when first thing I knew the whole 
lot of them had ceased paying any attention and 
191 



Further Foolishness 



were all listening to an insufferable ass of 
an Englishman — I forget his name. You'd 
hardly suppose that just because a man has 
been in Flanders and has his arm in a sling 
and has to have his food cut up by the butler, 
that's any reason for having a whole tableful 
of people listening to him. And especially the 
women : they have a way of listening to a fool 
like that with their elbows on the table that 
is positively sickening. 

I felt that the whole thing was out of taste 
and tried in vain, in one of the pauses, to give a 
lead to my hostess by referring to the prospect 
of a shipping subsidy bill going through to 
offset the register of alien ships. But she was 
too utterly dense to take it up. She never even 
turned her head. All through dinner that ass 
talked — he and that silly young actor they're 
always asking there that is perpetually doing 
imitations of the vaudeville people. That kind 
of thing may be all right — for those who care 
for it: I frankly don't — outside a theatre. But 
to my mind the idea of trying to throw people 
into fits of laughter at a dinner table is simply 
192 



Movies ^ Motors, Men ^ Women 

execrable taste. I cannot see the sense of peo- 
ple shrieking with laughter at dinner. I have, 
I suppose, a better sense of humour than most 
people. But to my mind a humorous story- 
should be told quietly and slowly in a way to 
bring out the point of the humour and to make 
it quite clear by preparing for it with proper 
explanations. But with people like that I find 
I no sooner get well started with a story than 
some fool or other breaks in. I had a most 
amusing experience the other day — that is, 
about fifteen years ago — at a summer hotel in 
the Adirondacks, that one would think would 
have amused even a shallow lot of people like 
those, but I had no sooner started to tell it — 
or had hardly done more than to describe the 
Adirondacks in a general way — than, first thing 
I know, my hostess, stupid woman, had risen 
and all the ladies were trooping out. 

As to getting in a word edgeways with the 
men over the cigars — perfectly impossible! 
They're worse than the women. They were 
all buzzing round the infernal Englishman with 
questions about Flanders and the army at the 
193 



Further Foolishness 



front. I tried in vain to get their attention for 
a minute to give them my impressions of the 
Belgian peasantry (during my visit there in 
1885), but my host simply turned to me for 
a second and said, "Have some more port?" 
and was back again listening to the asinine 
Englishman. 

And when we went upstairs to the drawing- 
room I found myself, to my disgust, side- 
tracked in a corner of the room with that su- 
preme old jackass of a professor — their uncle, 
I think, or something of the sort. In all my 
life I never met a prosier man. He bored me 
blue with long accounts of his visit to Servia 
and his impressions of the Servian peasantry 
in 1875. 

I should have left early, but it would have 
been too noticeable. 

The trouble with a woman like that is that 
she asks the wrong people to her parties. 



BUT, 



194 



Movies 4 Motors,, Men S^ Women 



HIS LITTLE SON 

You haven't seen him? Why, that's In- 
credible. You must have. He goes past your 
house every day on his way to his kindergarten. 
You must have seen him a thousand times. 
And he's a boy you couldn't help noticing. 
You'd pick that boy out among a hundred, 
right away. "There's a remarkable boy," 
you'd say. I notice people always turn and 
look at him on the street. He's just the image 
of me. Everybody notices it at once. 

How old? He's twelve. Twelve and two 
weeks yesterday. But he's so bright you'd 
think he was fifteen. And the things he says ! 
You'd laugh ! I've written a lot of them down 
in a book for fear of losing them. Some day 
when you come up to the house I'll read them 
to you. Come some evening. Come early so 
that we'll have lots of time. He said to me one 
day, "Dad" (he always calls me Dad), "what 
makes the sky blue?" Pretty thoughtful, eh, 
195 



Further Foolishness 



for a little fellow of twelve? He's always 
asking questions like that. I wish I could re- 
member half of them. 

And I'm bringing him up right, I tell you. 
I got him a little savings box a while ago and 
have got him taught to put all his money in it, 
and not give any of it away, so that when he 
grows up he'll be all right. 

On his last birthday I put a five dollar gold 
piece into it for him and explained to him what 
five dollars meant, and what a lot you could 
do with it if you hung on to it. You ought 
to have seen him listen. 

"Dad," he says, "I guess you're the kindest 
man in the world, aren't you?" 

Come up some time- and see him. 



196 



XL— More than Twice Told Tales 

or 

Every Man His Own Hero 



I 

( The familiar story told about himself by 
the Commercial Traveller who sold goods to 
the man who was regarded as impossible.) 

WHAT," they said, "you're getting 
off at Midgeville? You're going 
to give the Jones Hardware Com- 
pany a try, eh?" — and then they 
all started laughing and giving me the merry 
ha ! ha ! Well, I just got my grip packed and 
didn't say a thing and when the train slowed up 
for Midgeville, out I slid. "Give my love to 
old man Jones," one of the boys called after 
me, "and get yourself a couple of porous plas- 
ters and a pair of splints before you tackle 
197 



Further Foolishness 



him!"- — and then they all gave me the ha! ha! 
again, out of the window as the train pulled 
out. 

Well, I walked uptown from the station to 
the Jones Hardware Company. "Is Mr. Jones 
in the office?" I asked of one of the young 
fellers behind the counter. "He's in the of- 
fice," he says, "all right, but I guess you can't 
see him," he says — and he looked at my grip. 
"What name shall I say?" says he. "Don't 
say any name at all," I says; "just open the 
door and let me in." 

Well, there was old man Jones sitting scowl- 
ing over his desk, biting his pen in that way 
he has. He looked up when I came in. "See, 
here, young man," he says, "you can't sell me 
any hardware," he says. "Mr. Jones," I says, 
"I don't want to sell you any hardware. I'm 
not here to sell you any hardware. I know," 
I says, "as well as you do," I says, "that I 
couldn't sell any hardware if I tried to. But," 
I says, "I guess it don't do any harm to open 
up this sample case, and show you some hard- 
ware," I says. "Young man," says he, "if you 
198 



Movies &, Motors, Men <§ Women 

start opening up that sample case in here, you'll 
lose your time, that's all" — and he turned off 
sort of sideways and began looking over some 
letters. 

"That's all right, Mr. Jones," I says; "that's 
all right. I'm here to lose my time. But I'm 
not going out of this room till you take a look 
anyway at some of this new cutlery I'm car- 
rying." 

So open I throws my sample case right across 
the end of his desk. "Look at that knife," I 
says, "Mr. Jones. Just look at it: clear Shef- 
jfield at three-thirty the dozen and they're a knife 
that will last till you wear the haft off it." 
"Oh, pshaw," he growled, "I don't want no 
knives; there's nothing in knives " 

Well I knew he didn't want knives, see? I 
knew it. But the way I opened up the sample 
case it showed up, just by accident so to speak, 
a box of those new electric burners — adjustable, 
you know — they'll take heat off any size of 
socket you like and use it for any mortal thing 
in the house. I saw old Jones had his eye on 
them in a minute. "What's those things you 
199 



Further Foolishness 



got there?" he growls, "those in the box?" 
"Oh," I said, "that's just a new line," I said, 
"the boss wanted me to take along: some sort 
of electric rig for heating," I said, "but I don't 
think there's anything to it. But here, now, 
Mr. Jones, is a spoon I've got on this trip — 
it's the new Delphide — you can't tell that, sir, 
from silver, no, sir," I says; "I defy any man, 
money down, to tell that there Delphide from 
genuine refined silver, and they're a spoon 
that'll last " 

"Let me see one of those burners," says old 
man Jones, breaking in. 

Well, sir, in about two minutes more, I had 
one of the burners fixed on to the light socket, 
and old Jones, with his coat off, boiling water 
in a tin cup (out of the store) and timing it 
with his watch. 

The next day I pulled into Toledo and went 
and joined the other boys up to the Jefferson 
House. "Well," they says, "have you got that 
plaster on?" and started in to give me the ha! 
ha I again. "Oh, I don't know," I says; "I 
guess this is some plaster, isn't it?" and I took 
200 



Movies <§ Motors, Men 6^ Women 

out of my pocket an order from old man Jones 
for two thousand adjustable burners, at four- 
twenty with two off. "Some plaster, eh?" I 
says. 

Well, sir, the boys looked sick. 

Old man Jones gets all his stuff from our 
house now. Oh, he ain't bad at all when you 
get to know him. 

II 

( The well known story told by the man who 
has once had a strange psychic experience.) 

. . . What you say about presentiments re- 
minds me of a strange experience that I had 
myself. 

I was sitting by myself one night very late, 
reading. I don't remember just what it was that 
I was reading. I think it was — or no, I don't 
remember what it was. Well, anyway, I was 
sitting up late reading quietly till it got pretty 
late on in the night. I don't remember just 
how late it was — half-past two, I think, or per- 
haps three — or, no, I don't remember. But, 

201 



Further Foolishness 



anyway, I was sitting up by myself very late 
reading. As I say, it was late, and after all the 
noises in the street had stopped, the house 
somehow seemed to get awfully still and quiet. 
Well, all of a sudden I became aware of a 
sort of strange feeling — I hardly know how to 
describe it — I seemed to become aware of 
something, as if something were near me. I 
put down my book and looked around, but 
could see nothing. I started to read again, but 
I hadn't read more than a page, or say a page 
and a half — or no, not more than a page, when 
again all of a sudden I felt an overwhelming 
sense of — something. I can't explain just what 
the feeling was, but a queer sense as if there 
was something somewhere. 

Well, I'm not of a timorous disposition 
naturally — at least I don't think I am — ^but 
absolutely I felt as if I couldn't stay in the 
room. I got up out of my chair and walked 
down the stairs, in the dark, to the dining- 
room. I felt all the way as if some one were 
following me. Do you know, I was absolutely 
trembling when I got into the dining-room and 

202 



Movies ^ Motors, 3Ien ^ Women 

got the lights turned on. I walked over to the 
sideboard and poured myself out a drink of 
whiskey and soda. As you know, I never take 
anything as a rule — or, at any rate, only when 
I am sitting round talking as we are now — 
but I always like to keep a decanter of whiskey 
in the house, and a little soda, in case of my 
wife or one of the children being taken ill 
in the night. 

Well, I took a drink and then I said to 
myself, I said, "See here, I'm going to see this 
thing through." So I turned back and walked 
straight upstairs again to my room. I fully 
expected something queer was going to happen 
and was prepared for it. But do you know 
when I walked Into the room again, the feel- 
ing, or presentiment, or whatever it was I had 
had, was absolutely gone. There was my book 
lying just where I had left it and the reading 
lamp still burning on the table, just as it had 
been and my chair just where I had pushed it 
back. But I felt nothing, absolutely nothing. 
I sat and waited a while, but I still felt nothing. 

I went downstairs again, to put out the 
203 



Further Foolishness 



lights in the dining-room. I noticed, as I 
passed the sideboard, that I was still shaking 
a little. So I took a small drink of whiskey — 
though as a rule I never care to take more 
than one drink — unless when I am sitting talk- 
ing as we are here. 

Well, I had hardly taken it when I felt an 
odd sort of psychic feeling — a sort of drowsi- 
ness. I remember, in a dim way, going to bed, 
and then I remember nothing till I woke up 
next morning. 

And here's the strange part of it. I had 
hardly got down to the office after breakfast 
when I got a wire to tell me that my mother- 
in-law had broken her arm in Cincinnati. 
Strange, wasn't it? No, not at half-past two 
during that night — that's the inexplicable part 
of it. She had broken it at half-past eleven 
the morning before. But you notice it was 
half-past in each case. That's the queer way 
these things go. 

Of course, I don't pretend to explain it. I 
suppose it simply means that I am telepathic 
— that's all. I imagine that, if I wanted to, I 
204 



Movies (^ Motors, Men 8^ Women 

could talk with the dead and all that kind of 
thing. But I feel somehow that I don't want 
to. 

Eh? Thank you, I will — though I seldom 
take more than — thanks, thanks, that's plenty 
of soda in it. 

Ill 

{The familiar narrative in which the Suc- 
cessful Business Man recounts the early strug- 
gles by which he made good.) 

. . . No, sir, I had no early advantages 
whatever. I was brought up plain and hard — 
try one of these cigars ; they cost me fifty cents 
each. In fact, I practically had no schooling 
at all. When I left school, I didn't know how 
to read, not to read good. It's only since I've 
been in business that I've learned to write 
English, that is so as to use it right. But I'll 
guarantee to say there isn't a man in the shoe 
business to-day can write a better letter than 
I can. But all that I know is what I've learned 
myself. Why, I can't do fractions even now. 
205 



Further Foolishness 



I don't see that a man need. And I never 
learned no geography, except what I got for 
myself off railroad folders. I don't believe a 
man needs more than that anyway. I've got 
my boy at Harvard now. His mother was set 
on it. But I don't see that he learns anything, 
or nothing that will help him any in business. 
They say they learn them character and man- 
ners in the colleges, but, as I see it, a man can 
get all that just as well in business — is that wine 
all right? If not, tell me and I'll give the head 
waiter hell; they charge enough for it; what 
you're drinking costs me four-fifty a bottle. 
But I was starting to tell you about my early 
start in business. I had it good and hard all 
right. Why when I struck New York — I was 
sixteen then — I had just eighty cents to my 
name. I lived on it for nearly a week while I 
was walking round hunting for a job. I used to 
get soup for three cents, and roast beef with 
potatoes, all you could eat, for eight cents, 
that tasted better than anything I can ever 
get in this damn club. It was down somewhere 
206 



Movies 4 Motors, Men <| Women 

on Sixth Avenue, but I've forgotten the way 
to it. 

Well, about the sixth day I got a job, down 
in a shoe factory, working on a machine. I 
guess you've never seen shoe-machinery, have 
you? No, you wouldn't likely. It's compli- 
cated. Even in those days there was thirty-five 
machines went to the making of a shoe, and 
now we use as many as fifty-four. I'd never 
seen the machines before, but the foreman took 
me on. "You look strong," he said; "I'll give 
you a try anyway." 

So I started in. I didn't know anything. 
But I made good from the first day. I got four 
a week at the start, and after two months I 
got a raise to four-twenty-five. 

Well, after I'd worked there about three 
months, I went up to the floor manager of the 
flat I worked on, and I said, "Say, Mr. Jones, 
do you want to save ten dollars a week on ex- 
penses?" "How?" says he. "Why," I said, 
"that foreman I'm working under on the ma- 
chine, I've watched him, and I can do his job; 
dismiss him and I'll take over his work at half 
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Further Foolishness 



what you pay him." "Can you do the work?" 
he says. "Try me out," I said; "fire him and 
give me a chance." "Well," he said, "I like 
your spirit anyway; you've got the right sort of 
stuff in you." 

So he fired the foreman and I took over the 
job and held it down. It was hard at first, but 
I worked twelve hours a day, and studied up a 
book on factory machinery at night. Well, 
after I'd been on that work for about a year, 
I went in one day to the general manager down- 
stairs, and I said, "Mr. Thompson, do you 
want to save about a hundred dollars a month 
on your overhead costs?" "How can I do 
that?" says he. "Sit down." "Why," I said, 
"you dismiss Mr. Jones and give me his place 
as manager of the floor, and I'll undertake to 
do his work, and mine with it, at a hundred 
less than you're paying now." He turned and 
went into the inner office, and I could hear 
him talking to Mr. Evans, the managing di- 
rector. "The young fellow certainly has char- 
acter," I heard him say. Then he came out 
and he said, "Well, we're going to give you a 
208 



Movies (| Motors^ Men <§ Women 

try anyway: we like to help out our employes 
all we can, you know; and you've got the sort 
of stuff In you that we're looking for." 

So they dismissed Jones next day and I 
took over his job and did It easy. It was noth- 
ing anyway. The higher up you get In business, 
the easier It Is If you know how. I held that 
job two years, and I saved all my salary ex- 
cept twenty-five dollars a month, and I lived 
on that. I never spent any money anyway. 
I went once to see Irving do this Macbeth for 
twenty-five cents, and once I went to a concert 
and saw a man play the violin for fifteen cents 
in the gallery. But I don't believe you get 
much out of the theatre anyway; as I see it, 
there's nothing to it. 

Well, after a while I went one day to Mr. 
Evans' office and I said, "Mr. Evans, I want 
you to dismiss Mr. Thompson, the general 
manager." "Why, what's he done?" he says. 
"Nothing," I said, "but I can take over his 
job on top of mine and you can pay me the 
salary you give him and save what you're pay- 
ing me now." "Sounds good to me," he says. 
209 



Further Foolishness 



So they let Thompson go and I took his place. 
That, of course, is where I got my real start, 
because, you see, I could control the output and 
run the costs up and down just where I liked. 
I suppose you don't know anything about costs 
and all that — they don't teach that sort of 
thing in colleges — but even you would under- 
stand something about dividends and would see 
that an energetic man with lots of character and 
business in him, if he's general manager can 
just do what he likes with the costs, especially 
the overhead, and the shareholders have just 
got to take what he gives them and be glad 
to. You see they can't fire him — not when he's 
got it all in his own hands — for fear it will 
all go to pieces. 

Why would I want to run it that way for? 
Well, I'll tell you. I had a notion by that 
time that the business was getting so big that 
Mr. Evans, the managing director, and most 
of the board had pretty well lost track of the 
details and didn't understand it. There's an 
awful lot, you know, in the shoe business. It's 
not like ordinary things. It's complicated. 

210 



Movies (| Motors, Men ^ Women 

And so I'd got an Idea that I would shove them 
clean out of it — or most of them. 

So I went one night to see the president, old 
Guggenbaum, up at his residence. He didn't 
only have this business, but he was in a lot of 
other things as well, and he was a mighty hard 
man to see. He wouldn't let any man see him 
unless he knew first what he was going to say. 
But I went up to his residence at night, and I 
saw him there. I talked first with his daughter, 
and I said I just had to see him. I said it so 
she didn't dare refuse. There's a way in talk- 
ing to women that they won't say no. 

So I showed Mr. Guggenbaum what I could 
do with the stock. "I can put that dividend," 
I says, "clean down to zero — and they'll none 
of them know why. You can buy the lot of 
them out at your own price, and after that I'll 
put the dividend back to fifteen, or even twenty, 
in two years." 

"And where do you come in?" says the old 
man, with a sort of hard look. He had a fine 
business head, the old man, at least in those 
days. 

211 



Further Foolishness 



So I explained to him where I came in. "All 
right," he said; "go ahead. But I'll put noth- 
ing in writing." "Mr. Guggenbaum, you don't 
need to," I said; "you're as fair and square as 
I am and that's enough for me." 

His daughter let me out of the house door 
when I went. I guess she'd been pretty scared 
that she'd done wrong about letting me in. But 
I said to her it was all right, and after that 
when I wanted to see the old man I'd always 
ask for her and she'd see that I got in all right. 

Got them squeezed out? Oh, yes, easy. 
There wasn't any trouble about that. You see 
the old man worked up a sort of jolt in whole- 
sale leather on one side, and I fixed up a strike 
of the hands on the other. We passed the 
dividend two quarters running, and within a 
year we had them all scared out and the bulk 
of the little stockholders, of course, trooped 
out after them. They always do. The old 
man picked up the stock when they dropped it, 
and one-half of it he handed over to me. 

That's what put me where I am now, do you 
see, with the whole control of the industry In 

212 



Movies (§ Motors, Men ^ Women 

two states and more than that now, because we 
have the Amalgamated Tanneries in with us, 
so it's practically all one concern. 

Guggenbaum? Did I squeeze him out? No, 
I didn't because, you see, I didn't have to. The 
way it was — well, I tell you — I used to go up to 
the house, see, to arrange things with him — 
and the way it was — why, you see, I married 
his daughter, see, so I didn't exactly need to 
squeeze him out. He lives up with us now, 
but he's pretty old and past business. In fact, 
I do it all for him now, and pretty well every- 
thing he has is signed over to my wife. She 
has no head for it, and she's sort of timid 
anyway — always was — so I manage it all. Of 
course, if anything happens to the old man, then 
we get it all. I don't think he'll last long. 
I notice him each day, how weak he's getting. 

My son in the business? Well, I'd like him 
to be. But he don't seem to take to It some- 
how — I'm afraid he takes more after his 
mother; or else it's the college that's doing it. 
Somehow, I don't think the colleges bring out 
business character, do you? 
213 



XII— A Study in Still Life— My 
Tailor 

HE always stands there — and has 
stood these thirty years — in the 
back part of his shop, his tape 
woven about his neck, a smile of 
welcome on his face, waiting to greet me. 

"Something in a serge?" he says, "or per- 
haps in a tweed?" 

There are only these two choices open to us. 
We have had no others for thirty years. It 
is too late to alter now. 

"A serge, yes," continues my tailor, "some- 
thing in a dark blue, perhaps." 

He says it with all the gusto of a new idea, 
as if the thought of dark blue had sprung up 
as an inspiration — "a dark blue — Mr. Jen- 
nings" (this is his assistant) , "kindly take down 
some of those dark blues." 

"Ah!" he exclaims, "now here is an excel- 
214 



Movies <§ Motors, Men (| Women 

lent thing." His manner as he says this is 
such as to suggest that by sheer good fortune 
and blind chance he has stumbled upon a thing 
among a million. 

He lifts one knee and drapes the cloth over 
It, standing upon one leg. He knows that in 
this attitude it is hard to resist him. Cloth to 
be appreciated as cloth must be viewed over 
the bended knee of a tailor with one leg in the 
air. 

My tailor can stand in this way indefinitely, 
on one leg in a sort of ecstasy, a kind of local 
paralysis. 

"Would that make up well?" I ask him. 

"Admirably," he answers. 

I have no real reason to doubt it. I have 
never seen any reason why cloth should not 
make up well. But I always ask the question 
as I know that he expects it and it pleases him. 
There ought to be a fair give and take in such 
things. 

"You don't think it at all loud?" I say. He 
always likes to be asked this. 

"Oh, no, very quiet indeed. In fact we al- 
215 



Further Foolishness 



ways recommend serge as extremely quiet." 

I have never had a wild suit in my life. But 
it is well to ask. 

Then he measures me — round the chest, 
nowhere else. All the other measures were 
taken years ago. Even the chest measure is 
only done — and I know it — to please me. I 
do not really grow. 

"A little fuller in the chest," my tailor muses. 
Then he turns to his assistant. "Mr. Jennings, 
a little fuller in the chest — half an inch on 
to the chest, please." 

It is a kind fiction. Growth around the chest 
is flattering even to the humblest of us. 

"Yes," my tailor goes on — he uses "yes" 
without any special meaning, "yes, and shall 
we say a week from Tuesday? Mr. Jennings, 
a week from Tuesday, please." 

"And will you please," I say, "send the bill 

to " but my tailor waves this aside. He 

does not care to talk about the bill. It would 
only give pain to both of us to speak of it. 

The bill is a matter we deal with solely by 
216 



Movies <§ Motors, 31en 8^ Women 

correspondence, and that only in a decorous and 
refined style never calculated to hurt. 

I am sure from the tone of my tailor's let- 
ters that he would never send the bill, or ask 
for the amount, were it not that from time to 
time he is himself, unfortunately, ^'pressed" 
owing to "large consignments from Europe." 
But for these heavy consignments, I am sure 
I should never need to pay him. It is true 
that I have sometimes thought to observe that 
these consignments are apt to arrive when I 
pass the limit of owing for two suits and order 
a third. But this can only be a mere coin- 
cidence. 

Yet the bill, as I say, is a thing that we 
never speak of. Instead of it my tailor passes 
to the weather. Ordinary people always begin 
with this topic. Tailors, I notice, end with it. 
It is only broached after the suit is ordered, 
never before. 

"Pleasant weather we are having," he says. 
It is never other, so I notice, with him. Per- 
haps the order of a suit itself is a little beam 
of sunshine. 

217 



Further Foolishness 



Then we move together towards the front 
of the store on the way to the outer door. 

"Nothing to-day, I suppose," says my tailor, 
"in shirtings?" 

"No, thank you." 

This is again a mere form. In thirty years 
I have never bought any shirtings from him. 
Yet he asks the question with the same win- 
someness as he did thirty years ago. 

"And nothing, I suppose, in collaring or in 
hosiery?" 

This again is futile. Collars I buy elsewhere 
and hosiery I have never worn. 

Thus we walk to the door, in friendly col- 
loquy. Somehow if he failed to speak of shirt- 
ings and of hosiery, I should feel as if a fa- 
mihar cord had broken. 

At the door we part. 

"Good afternoon," he says — "a week from 
Tuesday — yes — good afternoon." 

Such is — or was — our calm unsullied inter- 
course, unvaried or at least broken only by 
consignments from Europe. 
218 



Movies <| Motors, Men <§ Women 

I say it was, that is until just the other day. 

And then, coming to the familiar door, for 
my customary summer suit, I found that he 
was there no more. There were people in the 
store, unloading shelves and piling cloth and 
taking stock. And they told me that he was 
dead. It came to me with a strange shock. 
I had not thought it possible. He seemed — 
he should have been — immortal. 

They said the worry of his business had 
helped to kill him. I could not have believed 
it. It always seemed so still and tranquil — 
weaving his tape about his neck and marking 
measures and holding cloth against his leg be- 
side the sunlight of the window in the back 
part of the shop. Can a man die of that? 
Yet he had been "going behind," they said 
(however that is done), for years. His wife, 
they told me, would be left badly off. I had 
never conceived him as having a wife. But 
it seemed that he had, and a daughter, too — 
at a conservatory of music — (yet he never 
spoke of her) — and that he himself was musi- 
cal and played the flute, and was the sidesman 
219 



Further Foolishness 



of a church — ^yet he never referred to it to me. 
In fact, in thirty years we never spoke of re- 
ligion. It was hard to connect him with the 
idea of it. 

As I went out I seemed to hear his voice 

still saying, "and nothing to-day in shirtings?" 

I was sorry I had never bought any. 

There is, I am certain, a deep moral in this. 

But I will not try to draw it. It might appear 

too obvious. 



220 



FOLLIES IN FICTION 



XIII. — Stories Shorter Still 



{Among the latest follies in fiction is the 
perpetual demand for stories shorter and 
shorter still. The only thing to do is to meet 
this demand at the source and check it. Any 
of the stories below, if left to soak overnight 
in a barrel of rainwater, will swell to the di- 
mensions of a dollar-fifty novel.) 



AN IRREDUCIBLE DETECTIVE 
STORY 

Hanged by a Hair 

OR 

A Murder Mystery Minimised 

THE mystery had now reached its 
climax. First, the man had been 
undoubtedly murdered. Secondly, it 
was absolutely certain that no con- 
ceivable person had done it. 
223 



Further Foolishness 



It was therefore time to call in the great 
detective. 

He gave one searching glance at the corpse. 
In a moment he whipped out a microscope. 

"Ha! ha!" he said, as he picked a hair off 
the lapel of the dead man's coat. "The mys- 
tery is now solved." 

He held up the hair. 

"Listen," he said, "we have only to find the 
man who lost this hair and the criminal is in 
our hands." 

The inexorable chain of logic was com- 
plete. 

The detective set himself to the search. 

For four days and nights he moved, unob- 
served, through the streets of New York scan- 
ning closely every face he passed, looking for 
a man who had lost a hair. 

On the fifth day he discovered a man, dis- 
guised as a tourist, his head enveloped in a 
steamer cap that reached below his ears. The 
man was about to go on board the Gloritania. 

The detective followed him on board. 

"Arrest him!" he said, and then drawing 
224 



Follies in Fiction 



himself to his full height, he brandished aloft 
the hair. 

"This is his," said the great detective. "It 
proves his guilt." 

"Remove his hat," said the ship's captain 
sternly. 

They did so. 

The man was entirely bald. 

"Ha!" said the great detective, without a 
moment of hesitation. "He has committed not 
one murder but about a million." 

II 

A COMPRESSED OLD ENGLISH 
NOVEL 

Swearword the Unpronounceable 

CHAPTER ONE AND ONLY 

"Ods bodikins!" exclaimed Swearword the 
Saxon, wiping his mailed brow with his iron 
hand, "a fair morn withal! Methinks twert 
lithlier to rest me in yon glade than to foray me 
forth in yon fray! Twert it not?" 
225 



Further Foolishness 



But there happened to be a real Anglo- 
Saxon standing by, 

"Where in Heaven's name," he said in sud- 
den passion, "did you get that line of English?" 

"Churl!" said Swearword, "it is Anglo- 
Saxon." 

"You're a liar!" shouted the Saxon; "it is 
not. It is Harvard College, Sophomore Year, 
Option No. 6." 

Swearword, now in like fury, threw aside his 
hauberk, his baldrick, and his needlework on 
the grass. 

"Lay on!" said Swearword. 

"Have at you!" cried the Saxon. 

They laid on and had at one another. 

Swearword was killed. 

Thus luckily the whole story was cut off 
on the first page and ended. 



226 



Follies in Fiction 



III 

A CONDENSED INTERMINABLE 
NOVEL 

From the Cradle to the Grave 

OR 

A Thousand Pages for a Dollar 

Note. ( This story originally contained two 

hundred and fifty thousand words. But by a 

marvellous feat of condensation it is reduced, 

without the slightest loss, to a hundred and 

six words.) 

I 

Edward Endless lived during his youth 

in Maine, 

in New Hampshire, 

in Vermont, 

in Massachusetts, 

in Rhode Island, 

in Connecticut. 
II 

Then the lure of the city lured him. His 
fate took him to 

227 



Further Foolishness 



New York, to Chicago, and to Philadel- 
phia. 
In Chicago he lived, 

in a boarding house on Lasalle Avenue, 
then he boarded, — 
in a living house on Michigan Avenue. 
In New York he 

had a room in an eating house on Forty- 
first Street, 
and then, — 

ate in a rooming house on Forty-second 
Street. 
In Philadelphia he 

used to sleep on Chestnut Street, 
and then, — 
slept on Maple Street. 
During all this time women were calling to 
him. He knew and came to be friends with, — 
Margaret Jones, 

Elizabeth Smith, 

Arabella Thompson, 
Jane Williams, 

Maud Taylor. 
228 



Follies in Fiction 



And he also got to know, pretty well, 
Louise Quelquechose, 

Antoinette Alphabette, 

and Estelle Etcetera. 
And during this same time Art began to 
call him, — 

Pictures began to appeal to him, 
Statues beckoned to him. 
Music maddened him, 

and any form of Recitation or Elo- 
cution drove him beside himself. 

Ill 

Then, one day, he married Margaret Jones. 
As soon as he had married her 
he was disillusioned. 

He now hated her. 
Then he lived with Elizabeth Smith, — 

He had no sooner sat down with her, than, — 

He hated her. 
Half mad, he took his things over to Ara- 
bella Thompson's flat to live with her. 
229 



Further Foolishness 



The moment she opened the door of the 
apartment, he loathed her. 

He saw her as she was. 
Driven sane with despair, he then, — 
(Our staff here cut the story off. There 
are hundreds and hundreds of pages after this. 
They show Edward Endless grappling in the 
fight for clean politics. The last hundred pages 
deal with religion. Edward finds it after a big 
fight. But no one reads these pages. There 
are no women in them. Our staff cut them out 
and merely show at the end, — 
Edward Purified, — 

UpHfted, — 

Transluted. 
The whole story is perhaps the biggest thing 
ever done on this continent. Perhaps!) 



230 



XIV. — The Snoopopaths 
or Fifty Stories in One 



THIS particular study in the follies of 
literature is not so much a story as 
a sort of essay. The average reader 
will therefore turn from it with a 
shudder. The condition of the average read- 
er's mind is such that he can take in nothing 
but fiction. And it must be thin fiction at that 
— thin as gruel. Nothing else will "sit on his 
stomach." 

Everything must come to the present day 
reader in this form. If you wish to talk, to 
him about religion, you must dress It up as 
a story and label it Beth-sheha, or The Curse 
of David; if you want to improve the reader's 
morals, you must write him a little thing in 
dialogue called Mrs. Potiphar Dines Out. If 
you wish to expostulate with him about drink 
231 



Further Foolishness 



you must do so through a narrative called 
Red Rum — short enough and easy enough for 
him to read it, without overstraining his mind, 
while he drinks cocktails. 

But whatever the story is about it has got 
to deal — in order to be read by the average 
reader— with A MAN and A WOMAN. I 
put these words in capitals to indicate that 
they have got to stick out of the story with the 
crudity of a drawing done by a child with a 
burnt stick. In other words, the story has got 
to be snoopopathic. This is a word derived 
from the Greek — "snoopo" — or if there never 
was a Greek verb snoopo, at least there ought 
to have been one — and it means just what it 
seems to mean. Nine out of ten short stories 
written in America are snoopopathic. 

In snoopopathic literature, in order to get 
its full effect, the writer generally introduces 
his characters simply as "the man" and "the 
woman." He hates to admit that they have 
names. He opens out with them something 
after this fashion : 

"The Man lifted his head. He looked about 
232 



Follies in Fiction 



him at the gaily-bedizzled crowd that be- 
splotched the midnight cabaret with riotous 
patches of colour. He crushed his cigar 
against the brass of an Egyptian tray — 'Bah I' 
he murmured, 'Is it worth it?' Then he let 
his head sink again." 

You notice it? He lifted his head all the 
way up and let it sink all the way down, and 
you still don't know who he is. 

For The Woman the beginning is done like 
this: 

"The Woman clenched her white hands 
till the diamonds that glittered upon her fingers 
were buried in the soft flesh. 'The shame of 
it,' she murmured. Then she took from the 
table the telegram that lay crumpled upon it 
and tore it into a hundred pieces. 'He dare 
not!' she muttered through her closed teeth. 
She looked about the hotel room with its garish 
furniture. 'He has no right to follow me here,' 
she gasped." 

All of which the reader has to take in with- 
out knowing who the woman is, or which hotel 
she is staying at, or who dare not follow her 
233 



Further Foolishness 



or why. But the modern reader loves to get 
this sort of shadowy incomplete effect. If he 
were told straight out that the woman's name 
was Mrs. Edward Dangerfield of Brick City, 
Montana, and that she had left her husband 
three days ago and that the telegram told her 
that he had discovered her address and was 
following her, the reader would refuse to go 
on. 

This method of introducing the characters 
is bad enough. But the new snoopopathic way 
of describing them is still worse. The Man 
is always detailed as if he were a horse. He 
is said to be "tall, well set up, with straight 
legs." 

Great stress is always laid on his straight 
legs. No magazine story is acceptable now 
unless The Man's legs are absolutely straight. 
Why this is, I don't know. All my friends have 
straight legs — and yet I never hear them make 
it a subject of comment or boasting. I don't 
beheve I have, at present, a single friend with 
crooked legs. 

But this is not the only requirement. Not 
234 



Follies in Fiction 



only must The Man's legs be straight, but he 
must be "clean-limbed," whatever that is; and 
of course he must have a "well-tubbed look 
about him." How this look is acquired, and 
whether it can be got with an ordinary bath 
and water, are things on which I have no 
opinion. 

The Man is of course "clean-shaven." This 
allows him to do such necessary things as "turn- 
ing his clean-shaven face towards the speaker," 
"laying his clean-shaven cheek in his hand," 
and so on. But every one is familiar with the 
face of the up-to-date clean-shaven snoopo- 
pathic man. There are pictures of him by the 
million on magazine covers and book jackets, 
looking into the eyes of The Woman — he does 
it from a distance of about six inches — with 
that snoopy earnest expression of bralnlessness 
that he always wears. How one would enjoy 
seeing a man — a real one with Nevada whis- 
kers and long boots — land him one solid kick 
from behind. 

Then comes The Woman of the snoopo- 
pathlc story. She is always "beautifully 
235 



Further Foolishness 



groomed" (Who these grooms are that do it, 
and where they can be hired, I don't know), 
and she is said to be "exquisitely gowned." 

It is peculiar about The Woman that she 
never seems to wear a dress — always a 
"gown." Why this is, I cannot tell. In the 
good old stories that I used to read, when I 
could still read for the pleasure of it, the 
heroines — that was what they used to be 
called — always wore dresses. But now there 
is no heroine, only a woman in a gown. I 
wear a gown myself — at night. It is made 
of flannel and reaches to my feet, and when 
I take my candle and go out to the balcony 
where I sleep, the effect of it on the whole is 
not bad. But as to its "revealing every line 
of my figure" — as The Woman's gown is al- 
ways said to — and as to its "suggesting even 
more than it reveals" — well, it simply does not. 
So when I talk of "gowns" I speak of some- 
thing that I know all about. 

Yet whatever The Woman does, her "gown" 
is said to "cling" to her. Whether in the 
street or in a cabaret or in the drawing-room, 
236 



Follies in Fiction 



it "clings." If by any happy chance she throws 
a lace wrap about her, then it clings; and if 
she lifts her gown — as she is apt to — it shows 
— not what I should have expected — but a 
jiipon, and even that clings. What a jiipon is 
I don't know. With my gown, I never wear 
one. These people I have described, The Man 
and The Woman — The Snoopopaths — are, of 
course, not husband and wife, or brother and 
sister, or anything so simple and old-fashioned 
as that. She is some one else's wife. She is 
The Wife of the Other Man. Just what there 
is, for the reader, about other men's wives, I 
don't understand. I know tons of them that I 
wouldn't walk round a block for. But the 
reading public goes wild over them. The old- 
fashioned heroine was unmarried. That spoiled 
the whole story. You could see the end from 
the beginning. But with Another Man's Wife, 
the way is blocked. Something has got to 
happen that would seem almost obvious to 
any one. 

The writer, therefore, at once puts the two 
snoopos — The Man and The Woman — into a 
237 



Further Foolishness 



frightfully indelicate position. The more in- 
delicate it is, the better. Sometimes she gets 
into his motor by accident after the theatre, 
or they both engage the drawing-room of a 
Pullman car by mistake, or else, best of all, 
he is brought accidentally into her room at a 
hotel at night. There is something about a 
hotel room at night, apparently, which throws 
the modern reader into convulsions. It is al- 
ways easy to arrange a scene of this sort. For 
example, taking the sample beginning that I 
gave above. The Man — whom I left sitting at 
the cabaret table, above, rises unsteadily — it is 
the recognised way of rising in a cabaret — and, 
settling the reckoning with the waiter, stag- 
gers into the street. For myself I never do a 
reckoning with the waiter. I just pay the bill 
as he adds it, and take a chance on it. 

As The Man staggers into the "night air," 
the writer has time — just a little time, for the 
modern reader is impatient — to explain who 
he is and why he staggers. Fie is rich. That 
goes without saying. All clean-hmbed men 
with straight legs are rich. He owns copper 
238 



Follies in Fiction 



mines In Montana. All well-tubbed million- 
aires do. But he has left them, left everything, 
because of the Other Man's Wife. It was that 
or madness — or worse. He had told himself 
so a thousand times. (This little touch about 
**worse" is used in all the stories. I don't 
just understand what the "worse" means. But 
snoopopathic readers reach for it with great 
readiness.) So The Man had come to New 
York (the only place where stories are allowed 
to be laid) under an assumed name, to forget, 
to drive her from his mind. He had plunged 
into the mad round of — I never could find it 
myself, but it must be there, and as they all 
plunge into it, it must be as full of them as a 
sheet of Tanglefoot is of flies. 

"As The Man wallced home to his hotel, the 
cool, night air steadied him, but his brain is 
still filled with the fumes of the wine he had 
drunk." Notice these "fumes." It must be 
great to float round with them in one's brain, 
where they apparently lodge. I have often 
tried to find them, but I never can. Again and 
again I have said, "Waiter, bring me a Scotch 
239 



Further Foolishness 



whiskey and soda with fumes." But I can never 
get them. 

Thus goes The Man to his hotel. Now it 
is in a room in this same hotel that The Woman 
is sitting, and in which she has crumpled up the 
telegram. It is to this hotel that she has come 
when she left her husband, a week ago. The 
readers know, without even being told, that 
she left him "to work out her own salvation" 
— driven, by his cold brutality, beyond the 
breaking point. And there is laid upon her 
soul, as she sits there with clenched hands, the 
dust and ashes of a broken marriage and a love- 
less life, and the knowledge, too late, of all 
that might have been. 

And it is to this hotel that The Woman's 
Husband is following her. 

But The Man does not know that she is 
in the hotel; nor that she has left her husband; 
it is only accident that brings them together. 
And it is only by accident that he has come into 
her room, at night, and stands there — rooted 
to the threshold. 

Now as a matter of fact, in real life, there is 
240 



Follies in Fiction 



nothing at all In the simple fact of walking 
into the wrong room of a hotel by accident. 
You merely apologise and go out. I had this 
experience myself only a few days ago. I 
walked right into a lady's room — next door 
to my own. But I simply said, "Oh, I beg your 
pardon, I thought this was No. 343." 

"No," she said, "this is 341." 

She did not rise and "confront" me, as they 
always do in the snoopopathic stories. Neither 
did her eyes flash, nor her gown cling to her as 
she rose. Nor was her gown made of "rich 
old stuff." No, she merely went on reading 
her newspaper. 

"I must apologise," I said. "I am a little 
short-sighted, and very often a one and a three 
look so alike that I can't tell them apart. I'm 
afraid " 

"Not at all," said the lady. "Good eve- 
ning." 

"You see," I added, "this room and my own 
being so alike, and mine being 343 and this 
being 341, I walked in before I realised that 
241 



Further Foolishness 



instead of walking into 343 I was walking into 

341." 

She bowed in silence, without speaking, and 
I felt that it was now the part of exquisite tact 
to retire quietly without further explanation, 
or at least with only a few murmured words 
about the possibility of to-morrow being even 
colder than to-day. I did so, and the affair 
ended with complete savoir faire on both sides. 

But the Snoopopaths, Man and Woman, 
can't do this sort of thing, or, at any rate, the 
snoopopathic writer won't let them. The op- 
portunity is too good to miss. As soon as The 
Man comes into The Woman's room — before 
he knows who she is, for she has her back to 
him — he gets into a condition dear to all 
snoopopathic readers. 

His veins simply "surged." His brain beat 
against his temples in mad pulsation. His 
breath "came and went in quick, short pants." 
(This last might perhaps be done by one of 
the hotel bellboys, but otherwise it is hard 
to imagine.) 

And The Woman — "Noiseless as his step 
242 



Follies in Fiction 



had been she seemed to se?ise his presence. A 

wave seemed to sweep over her " She 

turned and rose "fronting him full." This 
doesn't mean that he was full when she front- 
ed him. Her gown — but we know about that 
already, "It was a coward's trick," she 
panted. 

Now if The Man had had the kind of savoir 
faire that I have, he would have said: "Oh, 
pardon me! I see this room is 341. My own 
room is 343, and to me a one and a three often 
look so alike that I seem to have walked into 
341 while looking for 343." And he could 
have explained in two words that he had no 
idea that she was in New York, was not fol- 
lowing her, and not proposing to interfere 
with her in any way. And she would have 
explained also in two sentences why and how 
she came to be there. But this wouldn't do. 
Instead of it, The Man and The Woman go 
through the grand snoopopathic scene which 
is so intense that it needs what is really a new 
kind of language to convey it. 

"Helene," he croaked, reaching out his arms 
243 



Further Foolishness 



— his voice tensed with the infinity of his de- 
sire. 

"Back," she iced. And then, "Why have 
you come here?" she hoarsed. "What busi- 
ness have you here?" 

"None," he glooped, "none. I have no busi- 
ness." They stood sensing one another. 

"I thought you were in Philadelphia," she 
said — her gown clinging to every fibre of her 
as she spoke. 

"I was," he wheezed. 

"And you left it?" she sharped, her voice 
tense. 

"I left it," he said, his voice glumping as he 
spoke. "Need I tell you why?" He had come 
nearer to her. She could hear his pants as he 
moved. 

"No, no," she gurgled. "You left it. It 
is enough. I can understand" — she looked 
bravely up at him — "I can understand any man 
leaving it." Then as he moved still nearer her, 
there was the sound of a sudden swift step in 
the corridor. The door opened and there stood 
244 



Follies in Fiction 



before them — The Other Man, the Husband 
of The Woman — Edward Dangerfield. 

This, of course, is the grand snoopopathic 
climax, when the author gets all three of them 
— The Man, The Woman, and The Woman's 
Husband — In a hotel room at night. But no- 
tice what happens. 

He stood in the opening of the doorway 
looking at them, a slight smile upon his lips, 
"Well?" he said. Then he entered the room 
and stood for a moment quietly looking Into 
The Man's face. 

"So," he said, "It was you." He walked into 
the room and laid the light coat that he had 
been carrying over his arm upon the table. He 
drew a cigar case from his waistcoat pocket. 

"Try one of these Havanas," he said. 

Observe the calm of It. This Is what the 
snoopopath loves — no rage, no blustering — 
calmness, cynicism. He walked over towards 
the mantel-piece and laid his hat upon it. He 
set his boot upon the fender. 

"It was cold this evening," he said. He 
245 



Further Foolishness 



walked over to the window and gazed a mo- 
ment Into the dark. 

"This is a nice hotel," he said. (This scene 
is what the author and the reader love ; they 
hate to let it go. They'd willingly keep the 
man walking up and down for hours saying 
*'Well!") 

The Man raised his head! "Yes, it's a good 
hotel," he said. Then he let his head fall 
again. 

This kind of thing goes on until, if possible, 
the reader is persuaded into thinking that there 
is nothing going to happen. Then: — 

"He turned to The Woman. *Go in there,' 
he said, pointing to the bedroom door. Me- 
chanically she obeyed." This, by the way, is 
the first intimation that the reader has that the 
room in which they were sitting was not a bed- 
room. The two men were alone. Dangerfield 
walked over to the chair where he had thrown 
his coat. 

"I bought this ioat in St. Louis last fall," 
he said. His voice was quiet, even passionless. 
Then from the pocket of the coat he took a 
246 



Follies in Fiction 



revolver and laid it on the table. Marsden 
watched him without a word. 

"Do you see this pistol?" said Dangerfield. 

Marsden raised his head a moment and let 
it sink. 

Of course the ignorant reader keeps wonder- 
ing why he doesn't explain. But how can he? 
What is there to say? He has been found out 
of his own room at night. The penalty for 
this in all the snoopopathic stories is death. It 
is understood that in all the New York hotels 
the night porters shoot a certain number of 
men in the corridors every night. 

"When we married," said Dangerfield, glanc- 
ing at the closed door as he spoke. "I bought 
this and the mate to it — for her — just the same, 
with the monogram on the butt — see ! And I 
said to her, 'If things ever go wrong between 
you and me, there is always this way out.' " 

He lifted the pistol from the table, examin- 
ing its mechanism. He rose and walked across 
the room till he stood wkh his back against 
the door, the pistol in his Irand, its barrel point- 
ing straight at Marsden's heart. Marsden 
247 



Further Foolishness 



never moved. Then as the two men faced 
one another thus, looking into one another's 
eyes, their ears caught a sound from behind 
the closed door of the inner room — a sharp, 
hard, metallic sound as if some one in the room 
within had raised the hammer of a pistol — a 
jewelled pistol like the one in Dangerfield's 
hand. 

And then — 

A loud report, and with a cry, the cry of a 
woman, one shrill despairing cry 

Or no, hang it — I can't consent to end up 
a story in that fashion, with the dead woman 
prone across the bed, the smoking pistol, with 
a jewel on the hilt, still clasped in her hand — 
the red blood welling over the white laces of 
her gown — while the two men gaze down upon 
her cold face with horror in their eyes. Not 
a bit. Let's end it like this: — 

"A shrill despairing cry, — 'Ed! Charlie! 
Come in here quick ! Hurry ! The steam coil 
has blown out a plug ! You two boys quit talk- 
ing and come in here, for Heaven's sake, and 
fix it' " 

248 



Follies in Fiction 



And, indeed, If the reader will look back he 
will see there is nothing in the dialogue to pre- 
clude it. He was misled, that's all. I merely- 
said that Mrs. Dangerfield had left her hus- 
band a few days before. So she had — to do 
some shopping in New York. She thought it 
mean of him to follow her. And I never said 
that Mrs. Dangerfield had any connection what- 
ever with The Woman with whom Marsden 
was in love. Not at all. He knew her, of 
course, because he came from Brick City. But 
she had thought he was in Philadelphia, and 
naturally she was surprised to see him back in 
New York. That's why she exclaimed "Back !" 
And as a matter of plain fact, you can't pick 
up a revolver without its pointing somewhere. 
No one said he meant to fire it. 

In fact, if the reader will glance back at the 
dialogue — I know he has no time to, but if he 
does — he will see that, being something of a 
snoopopath himself, he has invented the whole 
story. 



249 



JC^. — Foreign Fiction in Imported 
Instalments: Serge the Super- 
man. A Russian Novel. 

{Translated, vdth a hand pump, out of the original Russian.) 

(Special Editorial Note, or, Fit of Con- 
vulsions INTO Which an Editor Falls in 
Introducing This Sort of Story to His 
Readers. — fVe need offer no apology to our 
readers in presenting to them a Russian novel. 
There is no doubt that the future in literature 
lies with Russia. The names of Tolstoi, of 
Turgansome thing, and Dostoi-what-is-it are 
household words in America. We may say with 
certainty that Serge the Superman is the most 
distinctly Russian thing produced in years. The 
Russian view of life is melancholy and fatalistic. 
It is dark with the gloom of the great forests of 
the Volga, and saddened with the infinite silence 
of the Siberian plain. Hence the Russian 
250 



Follies in Fiction 



speech, like the Russian thought, is direct, terse 
and almost crude in its elemental power. All 
this appears in Serge the Superman. It is the 
directest, tersest, crudest thing we have ever 
seen. We showed the manuscript to a friend of 
ours, a critic, a man who has a greater command 
of the language of criticism than perhaps any 
two men in New York to-day. He said at once, 
"This is big. It is a big thing, done by a big 
man, a man with big ideas, writing at his very 
biggest. The whole thing has a bigness about it 
that is, — " and here he paused and thought a 
moment and added, — "big." After this he sat 
back in his chair and said, "big, big, big," till 
we left him. We next showed the story to an 
English critic and he said without hesitation, 
or with very little, "This is really not half 
bad." Last of all we read the story ourselves 
and we rose after its perusal, — itself not an 
easy thing to do, — and said, "Wonderful but 
terrible." All through our {free) lunch that 
day we shuddered.) 



251 



Further Foolishness 



CHAPTER I 

AS a child Serge lived with his father — 
Ivan Ivanovitch — and his mother — 
Katrina Katerinavitch. In the house, 
too, were Nitska, the serving maid, 
Itch, the serving man, and Yump, the cook, his 
wife. 

The house stood on the borders of a Rus- 
sian town. It was in the heart of Russia. All 
about it was the great plain with the river run- 
ning between low banks and over it the dull 
sky. 

Across the plain ran the post road, naked 
and bare. In the distance one could see a mou- 
jik driving a three-horse tarantula, or perhaps 
Swill, the swine-herd, herding the swine. Far 
away the road dipped over the horizon and 
was lost. 

"Where does it go to?" asked Serge. But 
no one could tell him. 

In the winter there came the great snows and 
the river was frozen and Serge could walk 
on it. 

252 



Follies in Fiction 



On such days Yob, the postman, would come 
to the door, stamping his feet with the cold as 
he gave the letters to Itch. 

"It is a cold day," Yob would say. 

"It is God's will," said Itch. Then he would 
fetch a glass of Kwas steaming hot from the 
great stove, built of wood, that stood in the 
kitchen. 

"Drink, little brother," he would say to 
Yob, and Yob would answer, "Little Uncle, I 
drink your health," and he would go down the 
road again, stamping his feet with the cold. 

Then later the spring would come and all 
the plain was bright with flowers and Serge 
could pick them. Then the rain came and 
Serge could catch it in a cup. Then the sum- 
mer came and the great heat and the storms 
and Serge could watch the lightning. 

"What is lightning for?" he would ask of 
Yump, the cook, as she stood kneading the 
mush, or dough, to make slab, or pancake, for 
the morrow. Yump shook her knob, or head, 
with a look of perplexity on her big mugg, or 
face. 

253 



Further Foolishness 



"It is God's will," she said. 

Thus Serge grew up a thoughtful child. 

At times he would say to his mother, "Ma- 
trinska" (little mother), "why is the sky blue?" 
And she couldn't tell him. 

Or at times he would say to his father, 
"Boob" (Russian for father), "what is three 
times six?" But his father didn't know. 

Each year Serge grew. 

Life began to perplex the boy. He couldn't 
understand it. No one could tell him any- 
thing. 

Sometimes he would talk with Itch, the serv- 
ing man. 

"Itch," he asked, "what is morality?" But 
Itch didn't know. In his simple life he had 
never heard of it. 

At times people came to the house — Snip, 
the schoolmaster, who could read and write, 
and Cinch, the harness maker, who made har- 
ness. 

Once there came Popoff, the inspector of 
police, in his blue coat with fur on it. He stood 
in front of the fire writing down the names of 
254 



Follies in Fiction 



all the people in the house. And when he came 
to Itch, Serge noticed how Itch trembled and 
cowered before Popoff, cringing as he brought 
a three-legged stool and saying, "Sit near the 
fire, little father; it is cold." Popoff laughed 
and said, "Cold as Siberia, is it not, little broth- 
er?" Then he said, "Bare me your arm to 
the elbow, and let me see if our mark is on 
it still." And Itch raised his sleeve to the elbow 
and Serge saw that there was a mark upon it 
burnt deep and black. 

"I thought so," said Popoff, and he laughed. 
But Yump, the cook, beat the fire with a stick 
so that the sparks flew into Popoff's face. "You 
are too near the fire, little inspector," she said. 
"It burns." 

All that evening Itch sat in the corner of 
the kitchen, and Serge saw that there were 
tears on his face, 

"Why does he cry?" asked Serge. 

"He has been in Siberia," said Yump as she 
poured water into the great iron pot to make 
soup for the week after the next. 

Serge grew more thoughtful each year. 
25s 



Further Foolishness 



All sorts of things, occurrences of daily life, 
set him thinking. One day he saw some peas- 
ants drowning a tax collector in the river. It 
made a deep impression on him. He couldn't 
understand it. There seemed something wrong 
about it. 

"Why did they drown him?" he asked of 
Yump, the cook. 

"He was collecting taxes," said Yump, and 
she threw a handful of cups into the cupboard. 

Then one day there was great excitement in 
the town, and men in uniform went to and fro 
and all the people stood at the doors talking. 

"What has happened?" asked Serge. 

"It is Popoff, inspector of police," answered 
Itch. "They have found him beside the river." 

"Is he dead?" questioned Serge. 

Itch pointed reverently to the ground, — "He 
is there!" he said. 

All that day Serge asked questions. But no 
one would tell him anything. "Popoff is dead," 
they said. "They have found him beside the 
river with his ribs driven In on his heart." 

"Why did they kill him?" asked Serge. 
256 



Follies in Fiction 



But no one would say. 

So after this Serge was more perplexed than 
ever. 

Every one noticed how thoughtful Serge was. 

"He is a wise boy," they said. "Some day he 
will be a learned man. He will read and write." 

"Defend us!" exclaimed Itch. "It is a dan- 
gerous thing." 

One day Liddoff, the priest, came to the 
house with a great roll of paper in his hand. 

"What is it?" asked Serge. 

"It is the alphabet," said Liddoff. 

"Give it to me," said Serge with eagerness. 

"Not all of it," said Liddoff, gently. "Here 
is part of it," and he tore off a piece and gave 
it to the boy. 

"Defend us!" said Yump, the cook. "It is 
not a wise thing," and she shook her head as 
she put a new lump of clay in the wooden stove 
to make it burn more brightly. 

Then everybody knew that Serge was learn- 
ing the alphabet, and that when he had learned 
it he was to go to Moscow, to the Teknik, and 
learn what else there was. 
257 



Further Foolishness 



So the days passed and the months. Pres- 
ently Ivan Ivanovitch said, "Now he is ready," 
and he took down a bag of rubles that was con- 
cealed on a shelf beside the wooden stove in 
the kitchen and counted them out after the Rus- 
sian fashion, "Ten, ten, and yet ten, and still 
ten, and ten," till he could count no further. 

"Protect us !" said Yump. "Now he is rich !" 
and she poured oil and fat mixed with sand into 
the bread and beat it with a stick. 

"He must get ready," they said. "He must 
buy clothes. Soon he will go to Moscow to the 
Teknik and become a wise man." 

Now it so happened that there came one day 
to the door a drosky, or one-horse carriage, 
and in it was a man and beside him was a girl. 
The man stopped to ask the way from Itch, 
who pointed down the post road over the plain. 
But his hand trembled and his knees shook as 
he showed the way. For the eyes of the man 
who asked the way were dark with hate and 
cruel with power. And he wore a uniform and 
there was brass upon his cap. But Serge looked 
only at the girl. And there was no hate in her 
258 



Follies in Fiction 



eyes, but only a great burning, and a look that 
went far beyond the plain, Serge knew not 
where. And as Serge looked, the girl turned 
her face and their eyes met, and he knew that 
he would never forget her. And he saw in her 
face that she would never forget him. For 
that is love. 

"Who is that?" he asked, as he went back 
again with Itch into the house. 

"It is Kwartz, chief of police," said Itch, 
and his knees still trembled as he spoke. 

"Where is he taking her?" said Serge. 

"To Moscow, to the prison," answered Itch. 
"There they will hang her and she will die." 

"Who is she?" asked Serge. "What has she 
done?" and as he spoke he could still see the 
girl's face, and the look upon it, and a great fire 
went sweeping through his veins. 

"She is Olga Ileyitch," answered Itch. "She 
made the bomb that killed Popoff, the inspec- 
tor, and now they will hang her and she will 
die." 

"Defend us I" murmured Yump, as she 
heaped more clay upon the stove. 
259 



Further Foolishness 



CHAPTER II 

Serge went to Moscow. He entered the 
Teknik. He became a student. He learned 
geography from Stoj, the professor, astrogra- 
phy from Fudj, the assistant, together with 
gihodesy, orgastrophy and other native Russian 

studies. 

All day he worked. His industry was un- 
flagging. His instructors were enthusiastic. 
"If he goes on like this," they said, "he will 
some day know something." 

"It is marvellous," said one; "if he continues 
thus, he will be a professor." 

"He is too young," said Stoj, shaking his 
head; "he has too much hair." 

"He sees too well," said Fudj. "Let him 
wait till his eyes are weaker." 

But all day as Serge worked he thought. 
And his thoughts were of Olga Ileyitch, the girl 
that he had seen with Kwartz, inspector of 
pohce. He wondered why she had killed Pop- 
off, the inspector. He wondered if she was 
dead. There seemed no justice in it. 
260 



Follies in Fiction 



One day he questioned his professor. 

"Is the law just?" he said. "Is it right to 
kill?" 

But Stoj shook his head, and would not an- 
swer. 

"Let us go on with our orgastrophy," he 
said. And he trembled so that the chalk shook 
in his hand. 

So Serge questioned no further, but he 
thought more deeply still. All the way from 
the Teknik to the house where he lodged he 
was thinking. As he climbed the stair to his 
attic room he was still thinking. 

The house in which Serge lived was the house 
of Madame Vasselitch. It was a tall dark 
house in a sombre street. There were no trees 
upon the street and no children played there. 
And opposite to the house of Madame Vas- 
selitch was a building of stone, with windows 
barred, that was always silent. In it were no 
lights and no one went in or out. 

"What is it?" Serge asked. 

"It is the house of the dead," answered 
261 



Further Foolishness 



Madame Vasselitch, and she shook her head 
and would say no more. 

The husband of Madame Vassehtch was 
dead. No one spoke of him. In the house were 
only students. Most of them were wild fellows, 
as students are. At night they would sit about 
the table in the great room drinking Kwas made 
from sawdust fermented in syrup, or golgol, 
the Russian absinthe, made by dipping a goose- 
berry in a bucket of soda water. Then they 
would play cards, laying matches on the table 
and betting, "Ten, ten, and yet ten," till all the 
matches were gone. Then they would say, 
"There are no more matches; let us dance," and 
they would dance upon the floor, till Madame 
Vasselitch would come to the room, a candle in 
her hand, and say, "Little brothers, it is ten 
o'clock. Go to bed." Then they went to bed. 
They were wild fellows, as all students are. 

But there were two students in the house of 
Madame Vasselitch who were not wild. They 
were brothers. They lived in a long room in 
the basement. It was so low that it was below 
the street. 

262 



Follies in Fiction 



The brothers were pale, with long hair. 
They had deep-set eyes. They had but little 
money. Madame Vasselitch gave them food. 
"Eat, little sons," she would say. "You must 
not die." 

The brothers worked all day. They were 
real students. One brother was Halfoff. He 
was taller than the other and stronger. The 
other brother was Kwitoff. He was not so 
tall as Halfoff and not so strong. 

One day Serge went to the room of the broth- 
ers. The brothers were at work. Halfoff sat 
at a table. There was a book in front of him. 

"What is it?" asked Serge. 

"It is solid geometry," said Halfoff, and 
there was a gleam in his eyes. 

"Why do you study it?" said Serge. 

"To free Russia," said Halfoff. 

"And what book have you?" said Serge to 
Kwitoff. 

"Hamblin Smith's Elementary Trigonom- 
etry," said Kwitoff, and he quivered like a leaf. 

"What does it teach?" asked Serge. 

"Freedom!" said Kwitoff. 
263 



Further Foolishness 



The two brothers looked at one another. 

"Shall we tell him everything?" said Half- 
off. 

"Not yet," said Kwitoff. "Let him learn 
first. Later he shall know." 

After that Serge often came to the room of 
the two brothers. 

The two brothers gave him books. "Read 
them," they said. 

"What are they?" asked Serge. 

"They are in English," said Kwitoff. "They 
are forbidden books. They are not allowed in 
Russia. But in them is truth and freedom." 

"Give me one," said Serge. 

"Take this," said Kwitoff. "Carry it under 
your cloak. Let no one see it." 

"What is it?" asked Serge, trembling in spite 
of himself. 

"It is Caldwell's Pragmatism," said the 
brothers. 

"Is it forbidden?" asked Serge. 

The brothers looked at him. 

"It is death to read it," they said. 

After that Serge came each day and got 
264 



Follies in Fiction 



books from Halfoff and Kwltoff. At night he 
read them. They fired his brain. All of them 
were forbidden books. No one in Russia might 
read them. Serge read Hamblin Smith's Al- 
gebra. He read it all through from cover to 
cover, feverishly. He read Murray's Calculus. 
It set his brain on fire. "Can this be true?" he 
asked. 

The books opened a new world to Serge. 

The brothers often watched him as he read. 

"Shall we tell him everything?" said Halfoflf. 

"Not yet," said Kwitoff; "he is not ready." 

One night Serge went to the room of the two 
brothers. They were not working at their 
books. Littered about the room were black- 
smith's tools and wires, and pieces of metal ly- 
ing on the floor. There was a crucible and 
underneath it a blue fire that burned fiercely. 
Beside it the brothers worked. Serge could see 
their faces in the light of the flame. 

"Shall we tell him now?" said Kwitoff. The 
other brother nodded. 

"Tell him now," he said. 

"Little brother," said Kwitoff, and he rose 
265 



Further Foolishness 



from beside the flame and stood erect, for he 
was tall, "will you give your life?" 

"What for?" asked Serge. 

The brothers shook their heads. 

"We cannot tell you that," they said. "That 
would be too much. Will you join us?" 

"In what?" asked Serge. 

"We must not say," said the brothers, "We 
can only ask are you willing to help our enter- 
prise with all your power and with your life if 
need be?" 

"What is your enterprise?" asked Serge. 

"We must not divulge it," they said. "Only 
this: Will you give your life to save another 
life, to save Russia?" 

Serge paused. He thought of Olga Ileyitch. 
Only to save her life would he have given his. 

"I cannot," he answered. 

"Good night, little brother," said Kwitoff 
gently, and he turned back to his work. 

Thus the months passed. 

Serge studied without ceasing. "If there is 
truth," he thought, "I shall find it." All the 
time he thought of Olga Ileyitch. His face 
266 



Follies in Fiction 



grew pale. "Justice, justice," he thought, "what 
is justice and truth?" 



CHAPTER III 

Now when Serge had been six months in the 
house of Madame Vasselitch, Ivan Ivanovitch, 
his father, sent Itch, the serving man, and 
Yump, the cook, his wife, to Moscow to see how 
Serge fared. And Ivan first counted out rubles 
into a bag, "ten, and ten and still ten," till Itch 
said, "It is enough. I will carry that." 

Then they made ready to go. Itch took a 
duck from the pond and put a fish in his pocket, 
together with a fragrant cheese and a bundle 
of sweet garhc. And Yump took oil and dough 
and mixed it with tar and beat it with an iron 
bar so as to shape it into a pudding. 

So they went forth on foot, walking till they 
came to Moscow. 

"It is a large place," said Itch, and he looked 
about him at the lights and the people. 

"Defend us," said Yump. "It is no place 
for a woman." 

267 



Further Foolishness 



"Fear nothing," said Itch, looking at her. 

So they went on, looking for the house of 
Madame Vasselitch. 

"How bright the lights are!" said Itch, and 
he stood still and looked about him. Then he 
pointed at a burleski, or theatre. "Let us go in 
there and rest," he said. 

"No," said Yump, "let us hurry on." 

"You are tired," said Itch. "Give me the 
pudding and hurry forward, so that you may 
sleep. I will come later, bringing the pudding 
and the fish." 

"I am not tired," said Yump. 

So they came at last to the house of Madame 
Vasselitch. And when they saw Serge they 
said, "How tall he is and how well grown!" 
But they thought, "He is pale, Ivan Ivanovitch 
must know." 

And Itch said, "Here are the rubles sent by 
Ivan Ivanovitch. Count them, little son, and 
see that they are right." 

"How many should there be?" said Serge. 

"I know not," said Itch; "you must count 
them and see." 

268 



Follies in Fiction 



Then Yump said, "Here is a pudding, little 
son, and a fish, and a duck and a cheese and 
garlic." 

So that night Itch and Yump stayed in the 
house of Madame Vasselitch. 

"You are tired," said Itch; "you must 
sleep." 

"I am not tired," said Yump. "It is only 
that my head aches and my face burns from the 
wind and the sun." 

"I will go forth," said Itch, "and find a 
fisski, or drug-store, and get something for 
your face." 

"Stay where you are," said Yump. And Itch 
stayed. 

Meantime Serge had gone up stairs with the 
fish and the duck and the cheese and the pud- 
ding. As he went up he thought, "It is selfish 
to eat alone. I will give part of the fish to the 
others." And when he got a little further up 
the steps he thought, "I will give them all of 
the fish." And when he got higher still he 
thought, "They shall have everything." 

Then he opened the door and came into the 
269 



Further Foolishness 



big room where the students were playing with 
matches at the big table and drinking golgol 
out of cups. "Here is food, brothers," he said. 
"Take it. I need none." 

The students took the food and they cried, 
"Rah, Rah," and beat the fish against the table. 
But the pudding they would not take. "We 
have no axe," they said. "Keep it." 

Then they poured out golgol for Serge and 
said, "Drink it." 

But Serge would not. 

"I must work," he said, and all the students 
laughed. "He wants to work!" they cried. 
"Rah, Rah." 

But Serge went up to his room and lighted 
his taper, made of string dipped in fat, and set 
himself to study. 

"I must work," he repeated. 

So Serge sat at his books. It got later and 
the house grew still. The noise of the students 
below ceased and then everything was quiet. 

Serge sat working through the night. Then 
presently it grew morning and the dark changed 
to twilight and Serge could see from his window 
270 



Follies in Fiction 



the great building with the barred windows 
across the street standing out in the grey mist 
of the morning. 

Serge had often studied thus through the 
night and when it was morning he would say, 
"It is morning," and would go down and help 
Madame Vasselitch unbar the iron shutters and 
unchain the door, and remove the bolts from 
the window casement. 

But on this morning as Serge looked from 
his window his eyes saw a figure behind the 
barred window opposite to him. It was the 
figure of a girl and she was kneeling on the 
floor and she was in prayer, for Serge could 
see that her hands were before her face. And 
as he looked all his blood ran warm to his head, 
and his limbs trembled even though he could 
not see the girl's face. Then the girl rose from 
her knees and turned her face towards the bars, 
and Serge knew that it was Olga Ileyitch and 
that she had seen and known him. 

Then he came down the stairs and Madame 
Vasselitch was there undoing the shutters and 
removing the nails from the window casing. 
271 



Further Foolishness 



"What have you seen, little son?" she asked, 
and her voice was gentle, for the face of Serge 
was pale and his eyes were wide. 

But Serge did not answer the question. 

"What is that house?" he said; "the great 
building with the bars that you call the house 
of the dead?" 

"Shall I tell you, little son," said Madame 
Vasselitch, and she looked at him, still thinking. 
"Yes," she said, "he shall know." 

"It is the prison of the condemned, and from 
there they go forth only to die. Listen, little 
son," she went on, and she gripped Serge by 
the wrist till he could feel the bones of her fin- 
gers against his flesh. "There lay my husband, 
Vangorod Vasselitch, waiting for his death. 
Months long he was there behind the bars and 
no one might see him or know when he was to 
die. I took this tall house that I might at least 
be near him till the end. But to those who lie 
there waiting for their death It is allowed once 
and once only that they may look out upon the 
world. And this is allowed to them the day 
before they die. So I took this house and 
272 



Follies in Fiction 



waited, and each day I looked forth at dawn 
across the street and he was not there. Then 
at last he came. I saw him at the window and 
his face was pale and set and I could see the 
marks of the iron on his wrists as he held them 
to the bars. But I could see that his spirit was 
unbroken. There was no power in them to 
break that. Then he saw me at the window, 
and thus across the narrow street we said good- 
bye. It was only a moment. 'Sonia Vasselitch,' 
he said, 'do not forget,' and he was gone. I 
have not forgotten. I have lived on here ia 
this dark house and I have not forgotten. My 
sons — yes, little brother, my sons, I say — have 
not forgotten. Now tell me, Sergius Ivano- 
vitch, what you have seen." 

"I have seen the woman that I love," said 
Serge, "kneeling behind the bars in prayer. I 
have seen Olga Ileyitch." 

"Her name," said Madame Vasselitch, and 
there were no tears in her eyes and her voice 
was calm, "her name is Olga Vasselitch. She 
is my daughter, and to-morrow she i^s to die.'" 



273 



Further Foolishness 



CHAPTER IV 

Madame Vasselltch took Serge by the hand. 

"Come," she said, "you shall speak to my 
sons," and she led him down the stairs towards 
the room of Halfoff and Kwitoff. 

"They are my sons," she said. "Olga is 
their sister. They are working to save her." 

Then she opened the door. Halfo.ff and 
Kwitoff were working as Serge had seen them 
before, beside the crucible with the blue flame 
on their faces. 

They had not slept. 

Madame Vasselitch spoke. 

"He has seen Olga," she said. "It is to- 
day." 

"We are too late," said Halfoff, and he 
groaned. 

"Courage, brother," said Kwitoff. "She will 
not die till sunrise. It is twilight now. We 
have still an hour. Let us go to work." 

Serge looked at the brothers. 

"Tell me," he said. "I do not understand." 
274 



Follies in Fiction 



Halfoff turned a moment from his work and 
looked at Serge. 

"Brother," he said, "will you give your 
life?" 

"Is it for Olga?" asked Serge. 

"It is for her." 

"I give it gladly," said Serge. 

"Listen then," said Halfoff. "Our sister is 
condemned for the killing of Popoff, inspector 
of police. She is in the prison of the con- 
demned, the house of the dead, across the 
street. Her cell is there beside us. There is 
only a wall between. Look " 

Halfoff as he spoke threw aside a curtain that 
hung across the end of the room. Serge looked 
into blackness. It was a tunnel. 

"It leads to the wall of her cell," said Half- 
off. "We are close against the wall but we 
cannot shatter it. We are working to make a 
bomb. No bomb that we can make is hard 
enough. We can only try once. If it fails the 
noise would ruin us. There is no second chance. 
We try our bombs in the crucible. They crum- 
ble. They have no strength. We are ig- 
275 



Further Foolishness 



norant. We are only learning. We studied It 
In the books, the forbidden books. It took a 
month to learn to set the wires to fire the bomb. 
The tunnel was there. We did not have to dig. 
It was for my father, Vangorod Vasselltch. He 
would not let them use It. He tapped a message 
through the wall, 'Keep It for a greater need.' 
Now It Is his daughter that Is there." 

Halfoff paused. He was panting and his 
chest heaved. There was perspiration on his 
face and his black hair was wet. 

"Courage, little brother," said Kwitoff; "she 
shall not die." 

"Listen," went on Halfoff. "The bomb is 
made. It is there beside the crucible. It has 
power In it to shatter the prison. But the wires 
are wrong. They do not work. There is no 
current in them. Something is wrong. We 
cannot explode the bomb." 

"Courage, courage," said Kwitoff, and his 
hands were busy among the wires before him. 
"I am working still." 

Serge looked at the brothers. 

"Is that the bomb?" he said, pointing at a 
276 



Follies in Fiction 



great ball of metal that lay beside the crucible. 

"It Is," said Halfoff. 

"And the little fuse that Is In the side of It 
fires it? And the current from the wires lights 
the fuse?" 

"Yes," said Halfoff. 

The two brothers looked at Serge, for there 
was a meaning in his voice and a strange look 
upon his face. 

"If the bomb Is placed against the wall and 
if the fuse is lighted It would explode." 

"Yes," said Halfoff despairingly, "but how? 
The fuse is Instantaneous. Without the wires 
we cannot light It. It would be death." 

Serge took the bomb In his hand. His face 
was pale. 

"Let It be so !" he said. "I will give my life 
for hers." 

He lifted the bomb In his hand. "I will go 
through the tunnel and hold the bomb against 
the wall and fire It," he said. "Halfoff, light 
me the candle in the flame. Be ready when 
the wall falls." 

277 



Further Foolishness 



"No, no," said Halfoff, grasping Serge by 
the arm, — "you must not die !" 

"My brother," said Kwitoff quietly, "let 
it be as he says. It is for Russia!" 

But as Halfoff turned to light the candle in 
the flame there came a great knocking at the 
door above and the sound of many voices in 
the street. 

All paused. 

Madame Vasselitch laid her hand upon her 
lips. 

Then there came the sound as of grounded 
muskets on the pavement of the street and a 
sharp word of command. 

"Soldiers!" said Madame Vasselitch. 

Kwitoff turned to his brother. "This is the 
end," he said; "explode the bomb here and let 
us die together." 

Suddenly Madame Vasselitch gave a cry, — 

"It is Olga's voice!" she said. 

She ran to the door and opened it, and a 
glad voice was heard crying, "It is I, Olga, and 
I am free!" 

"Free," exclaimed the brothers. 
278 



Follies in Fiction 



All hastened up the stairs. 

Olga was standing before them in the hall 
and beside her were the officers of the police 
and in the street were the soldiers. The stu- 
dents from above had crowded down the stairs 
and with them were Itch, the serving man, and 
Yump, the cook. 

*'I am free," cried Olga, "liberated by the 
bounty of the Czar — Russia has declared war 
to fight for the freedom of the world and all 
the political prisoners are free." 

"Rah, rah!" cried the students. "War, war, 
war!" 

"She is set free," said the officer who stood 
beside Olga. "The charge of killing Popoff 
is withdrawn. No one will be punished for it 
now." 

"I never killed him," said Olga, "I swear 
it," and she raised her hand. 

"You never killed him!" exclaimed Serge 
with joy in his heart. "You did not kill Pop- 
off? But who did?" 

"Defend us," said Yump, the cook. "Since 
279 



Further Foolishness 



there Is to be no punishment for it, I killed him 
myself." 

"You!" they cried. 

"It is so," said Yump. "I killed him beside 
the river. It was to defend my honour." 

"It was to defend her honour," cried the 
brothers. "She has done well." 

They clasped her hand. 

"You destroyed him with a bomb?" they 
said. 

"No," said Yump, "I sat down on him." 

"Rah, rah, rah," said the students. 

There was silence a moment. Then Kwitoff 
spoke. 

"Friends," he said, "the new day is coming. 
The dawn is breaking. The moon is rising. 
The stars are setting. It is the birth of free- 
dom. See! we need it not!" — and as he spoke 
he grasped in his hands the bomb with its still 
unlighted fuse, — "Russia is free. We are all 
brothers now. Let us cast it at our enemies. 
Forward! To the frontier! Live the Czar." 



280 



TIMID THOUGHTS ON 
TIMELY TOPICS 



XVI. — Are the Rich Happy? 



LET me admit at the outset that I write 
this essay without adequate material. 
I have never known, I have never 
seen, any rich people. Very often I 
have thought that I had found them. But it 
turned out that it was not so. They were not 
rich at all. They were quite poor. They were 
hard up. They were pushed for money. They 
didn't know where to turn for ten thousand dol- 
lars. 

In all the cases that I have examined this 
same error has crept in. I had often imagined, 
from the fact of people keeping fifteen servants, 
that they were rich. I had supposed that be- 
cause a woman rode down town in a limousine 
to buy a fifty-dollar hat, she must be well-to-do. 
Not at all. All these people turn out on ex- 
amination to be not rich. They are cramped. 
283 



Further Foolishness 



They say it themselves. Pinched, I think is 
the word they use. When I see a glittering 
group of eight people in a stage box at the 
opera, I know that they are all pinched. The 
fact that they ride home in a limousine has 
nothing to do with it. 

A friend of mine who has ten thousand dol- 
lars a year told me the other day with a sigh 
that he found it quite impossible to keep up 
with the rich. On his income he couldn't do it. 
A family that I know who have twenty thou- 
sand a year have told me the same thing. They 
can't keep up with the rich. There is no use in 
trying. A man that I respect very much who 
has an income of fifty thousand dollars a year 
from his law practice has told me with the 
greatest frankness that he finds it absolutely 
impossible to keep up with the rich. He says 
it is better to face the brutal fact of being poor. 
He says he can only give me a plain meal — 
what he calls a home dinner — it takes three 
men and two women to serve it, — and he begs 
me to put up with it. 

As far as I remember, I have never met Mr. 
284 



Timid Thoughts on Timely Topics 

Carnegie. But I know that if I did he would 
tell me that he found it quite impossible to keep 
up with Mr. Rockefeller, No doubt Mr. 
Rockefeller has the same feeling. 

On the other hand there are, and there 
must be, rich people somewhere. I run across 
traces of them all the time. The janitor in 
the building where I work has told me that he 
has a rich cousin in England who is in the 
South Western Railway and gets ten pounds a 
week. He says the railway wouldn't know 
what to do without him. In the same way the 
lady who washes at my house has a rich uncle. 
He lives in Winnipeg and owns his own house, 
clear, and has two girls at the high school. 

But these are only reported cases of rich- 
ness. I cannot vouch for them myself. 

When I speak therefore of rich people and 
discuss whether they are happy, It Is understood 
that I am merely drawing my conclusions from 
the people that I see and know. 

My judgment is that the rich undergo cruel 
trials and bitter tragedies of which the poor 
know nothing. 

285 



Further Foolishness 



In the first place I find that the rich suffer 
perpetually from money troubles. The poor 
sit snugly at home while sterling exchange falls 
ten points in a day. Do they care? Not a bit. 
An adverse balance of trade washes over the 
nation like a flood. Who have to mop it up? 
The rich. Call money rushes up to a hundred 
per cent, and the poor can still sit and laugh at 
a ten cent moving picture show and forget it. 

But the rich are troubled by money all the 
time. 

I know a man, for example — his name Is 
Spugg — whose private bank account was over- 
drawn last month twenty thousand dollars. He 
told me so at dinner at his club, with apologies 
for feeling out of sorts. He said it was bother- 
ing him. He said he thought it rather unfair 
of his bank to have called his attention to it. 
I could sympathise, in a sort of way, with his 
feelings. My own account was overdrawn 
twenty cents at the time. I knew that If the 
bank began calling in overdrafts It might be 
my turn next. Spugg said he supposed he'd 
have to telephone his secretary in the morning 
286 



Timid Thoughts on Timely Topics 

to sell some bonds and cover it. It seemed an 
awful thing to have to do. Poor people are 
never driven to this sort of thing. I have known 
cases of their having to sell a little furniture, 
perhaps, but imagine having to sell the very- 
bonds out of one's desk. There's a bitterness 
about it that the poor can never know. 

With this same man, Mr. Spugg, I have often 
talked of the problem of wealth. He is a self- 
made man and he has told me again and again 
that the wealth he has accumulated is a mere 
burden to him. He says that he was much hap- 
pier when he had only the plain, simple things 
of life. Often as I sit at dinner with him over a 
meal of nine courses, he tells me how much he 
would prefer a plain bit of boiled pork, with a 
little mashed turnip. He says that if he had his 
way he would make his dinner out of a couple 
of sausages, fried with a bit of bread. I forget 
what it is that stands in his way. I have seen 
Spugg put aside his glass of champagne — or 
his glass after he had drunk his champagne — 
with an expression of something like contempt. 
He says that he remembers a running creek at 
287 



Further Foolishness 



the back of his father's farm where he used to 
lie at full length upon the grass and drink his 
fill. Champagne, he says, never tasted like that. 
I have suggested that he should lie on his stom- 
ach on the floor of the club and drink a saucer- 
ful of soda water. But he won't. 

I know well that my friend Spugg would be 
glad to be rid of his wealth altogether, if such 
a thing were possible. Till I understood about 
these things, I always imagined that wealth 
could be given away. It appears that It can 
not. It is a burden that one must carry. 
Wealth, If one has enough of it, becomes a form 
of social service. One regards it as a means 
of doing good to the world, of helping to 
brighten the lives of others, in a word, a solemn 
trust. Spugg has often talked with me so long 
and so late on this topic — the duty of brighten- 
ing the lives of others — that the waiter who 
held blue flames for his cigarettes fell asleep 
against a door post, and the chauffeur outside 
froze to the seat of his motor. 

Spugg's wealth, I say, he regards as a solemn 
trust. I have often asked him why he didn't 
288 



Timid Thoughts on Timely Topics 

give it, for example, to a college. But he tells 
me that unfortunately he is not a college man. 
I have called his attention to the need of 
further pensions for college professors; after 
all that Mr. Carnegie and others have done, 
there are still thousands and thousands of old 
professors of thirty-five and even forty, work- 
ing away day after day and getting nothing 
but what they earn themselves, and with no pro- 
vision beyond the age of eighty-five. But Mr. 
Spugg says that these men are the nation's 
heroes. Their work is its own reward. 

But after all, Mr. Spugg's troubles — for he 
is a single man with no ties — are in a sense 
selfish. It is perhaps in the homes — or more 
properly in the residences — of the rich that 
the great silent tragedies are being enacted ev- 
ery day — tragedies of which the fortunate poor 
know and can know nothing. 

I saw such a case only a few nights ago at 
the house of the Ashcroft-Fowlers, where I 
was dining. As we went in to dinner, Mrs. Ash- 
croft-Fowler said in a quiet aside to her hus- 
band, "Has Meadows spoken?" He shook his 
289 



Further Foolishness 



head rather gloomily and answered, "No, he 
has said nothing yet." I saw them exchange a 
glance of quiet sympathy and mutual help, like 
people in trouble, who love one another. 

They were old friends and my heart beat for 
them. All through the dinner as Meadows — 
he was their butler — poured out the wine with 
each course, I could feel that some great trouble 
was impending over my friends. 

After Mrs. Ashcroft-Fowler had risen and 
left us, and we were alone over our port wine, 
I drew my chair near to Fowler's and I said, 
"My dear Fowler, I'm an old friend and you'll 
excuse me if I seem to be taking a liberty. But 
I can see that you and your wife are in trouble." 

"Yes," he said very sadly and quietly, "we 
are." 

"Excuse me," I said. "Tell me — for it 
makes a thing easier if one talks about it — is 
it anything about Meadows?" 

"Yes," he said, "it is about Meadows." 

There was silence for a moment but I knew 
already what Fowler was going to say. I 
could feel it coming. 

290 



Timid Thoughts on Timely Topics 

"Meadows," he said presently, constraining 
himself to speak with as little emotion as pos- 
sible, "is leaving us." 

"Poor old chap !" I said, taking his hand. 

"It's hard, isn't it?" he said. "Franklin left 
last winter — no fault of ours; we did every- 
thing we could — and now Meadows." 

There was almost a sob in his voice. 

"He hasn't spoken definitely as yet," Fowler 
went on, "but we know there's hardly any 
chance of his staying." 

"Does he give any reason?" I asked. 

"Nothing specific," said Fowler. "It's just 
a sheer case of incompatibility. Meadows 
doesn't like us." 

He put his hand over his face and was silent. 

I left very quietly a little later, without go- 
ing up to the drawing room. A few days after- 
wards I heard that Meadows had gone. The 
Ashcroft-Fowlers, I am told, are giving up in 
despair. They are going to take a little suite 
of ten rooms and four baths in the Grand Pala- 
ver Hotel, and rough it there for the winter. 

Yet one must not draw a picture of the ricK 
291 



Further Foolishness 



in colours altogether gloomy. There are cases 
among them of genuine, light-hearted happi- 
ness. 

I have observed that this Is especially the case 
among those of the rich who have the good for- 
tune to get ruined, absolutely and completely 
ruined. They may do this on the Stock Ex- 
change or by banking or In a dozen other ways. 
The business side of getting ruined Is not diffi- 
cult. 

Once the rich are ruined, they are — as far as 
my observation goes — all right. They can then 
have anything they want. 

I saw this point illustrated again just re- 
cently. I was walking with a friend of mine 
and a motor passed bearing a neatly dressed 
young man, chatting gaily with a pretty woman. 
My friend raised his hat and gave it a jaunty 
and cheery swing in the air as If to wave 
goodwill and happiness. 

"Poor old Edward Overjoy!" he said, as 
the motor moved out of sight. 

"What's wrong with him?" I asked. 

"Hadn't you heard ?" said my friend. "He's 
292 



Timid Thoughts on Timely Topics 

ruined — absolutely cleaned out — not a cent 
left." 

"Dear me !" I said. "That's awfully hard. 
I suppose he'll have to sell that beautiful 
motor?" 

My friend shook his head. "Oh, no," he 
said. "He'll hardly do that. I don't think 
his wife would care to sell that." 

My friend was right. The Overjoys have 
not sold their motor. Neither have they sold 
their magnificent sandstone residence. They 
are too much attached to it, I believe, to sell 
It. Some people thought they would have given 
up their box at the opera. But it appears not. 
They are too musical to care to do that. Mean- 
time it is a matter of general notoriety that 
the Overjoys are absolutely ruined; In fact, 
they haven't a single cent. You could buy 
Overjoy — so I am informed — for ten dollars. 

But I observe that he still wears a seal 
lined coat worth at least five hundred. 



293 



XVIL— Humor As I See It 



IT is only fair that at the back of this 
book I should be allowed a few pages 
to myself to put down some things that 
I really think. 
Until two weeks ago I might have taken my 
pen in hand to write about humour with the 
confident air of an acknowledged professional. 
But that time is past. Such claim as I had 
has been taken from me. In fact I stand un- 
masked. An English reviewer writing in a 
literary journal, the very name of which is 
€nough to put contradiction to sleep, has said 
of my writing, "What is there, after all, in 
Professor Leacock's humour but a rather in- 
genious mixture of hyperbole and myosis?" 
The man was right. How he stumbled upon 
this trade secret, I do not know. But I am 
willing to admit, since the truth is out, that 
it has long been my custom in preparing an 
294 



Timid Thoughts on Timely Topics 

article of a humorous nature to go down to 
the cellar and mix up half a gallon of myosis 
with a pint of h)^erbole. If I want to give 
the article a decidedly literary character, I find 
it well to put in about half a pint of paresis. 
The whole thing is amazingly simple. 

But I only mention this by way of introduc- 
tion and to dispel any idea that I am conceited 
enough to write about humour, with the pro- 
fessional authority of Ella Wheeler Wilcox 
writing about love, or Eva Tanguay talking 
about dancing. 

All that I dare claim is that I have as much 
sense of humour as other people. And, oddly 
enough, I notice that everybody else makes this 
same claim. Any man will admit, if need be, 
that his sight is not good, or that he cannot 
swim, or shoots badly with a rifle, but to 
touch upon his sense of humour is to give him 
a mortal affront. 

"No," said a friend of mine the other day, 
"I never go to Grand Opera," and then he 
added with an air of pride — "You see, I have 
absolutely no ear for music." 
295 



Further Foolishness 



"You don't say so!" I exclaimed. 

"None!" he went on. "I can't tell one tune 
from another. I don't know Home Sweet 
Home from God, Save the King. I can't tell 
whether a man is tuning a violin or playing a 
sonata." 

He seemed to get prouder and prouder over 
each item of his own deficiency. He ended 
by saying that he had a dog at his house that 
had a far better ear for music than he had. 
As soon as his wife or any visitor started to 
play the piano the dog always began to howl — 
plaintively, he said, as if it were hurt. He him- 
self never did this. 

When he had finished I made what I thought 
a harmless comment. 

"I suppose," I said, "that you find your 
sense of humour deficient in the same way: 
the two generally go together." 

My friend was livid with rage in a mo- 
ment. 

"Sense of humour!" he said. "My sense 
of humour! Me without a sense of humour! 
Why, I suppose I've a keener sense of humour 
296 



Timid Thoughts on Timely Topics 

than any man, or any two men, in this city!" 

From that he turned to bitter personal at- 
tack. He said that my sense of humour seemed 
to have withered altogether. 

He left me, still quivering with indignation. 

Personally, however, I do not mind making 
the admission, however damaging it may be, 
that there are certain forms of so-called hu- 
mour, or, at least, fun, which I am quite un- 
able to appreciate. Chief among these is that 
ancient thing called the Practical Joke. 

"You never knew McGann, did you?" a 
friend of mine asked me the other day. When 
I said "No, I had never known McGann," he 
shook his head with a sigh, and said: 

"Ah, you should have known McGann. He 
had the greatest sense of humour of any man 
I ever knew — always full of jokes. I remem- 
ber one night at the boarding house where we 
were, he stretched a string across the passage- 
way and then rang the dinner bell. One of 
the boarders broke his leg. We nearly died 
laughing." 

297 



Further Foolishness 



"Dear me!" I said. "What a humorist! 
Did he often do things like that?" 

"Oh, yes, he was at them all the time. He 
used to put tar in the tomato soup, and bees- 
wax and tin-tacks on the chairs. He was full 
of ideas. They seemed to come to him with- 
out any trouble. 

McGann, I understand, is dead. I am not 
sorry for it. Indeed I think that for most of 
us the time has gone by when we can see the 
fun of putting tacks on chairs, or thistles in 
beds, or hve snakes in people's boots. 

To me it has always seemed that the very 
essence of good humour is that it must be with- 
out harm and without malice. I admit that 
there is in all of us a certain vein of the old 
original demoniacal humour or joy in the mis- 
fortune of another which sticks to us like our 
original sin. It ought not to be funny to see 
a man, especially a fat and pompous man, slip 
suddenly on a banana skin. But it is. When a 
skater on a pond who is describing graceful 
circles and showing off before the crowd, breaks 
through the ice and gets a ducking, everybody 
298 



Timid Thoughts on Timely Topics 

shouts with joy. To the original savage, the 
cream of the joke In such cases was found If 
the man who slipped broke his neck, or the 
man who went through the Ice never came up 
again. I can imagine a group of pre-hlstoric 
men standing round the Ice-hole where he had 
disappeared and laughing till their sides split. 
If there had been such a thing as a pre- 
historic newspaper, the affair would have been 
headed up : "Amusing Incident. Unknown Gen- 
tleman Breaks Through Ice and Is Drowned." 

But our sense of humour under civilisation 
has been weakened. Much of the fun of this 
sort of thing has been lost on us. 

Children, however, still retain a large share 
of this primitive sense of enjoyment. 

I remember once watching two little boys 
making snow-balls at the side of the street and 
getting ready a little store of them to use. As 
they worked there came along an old man wear- 
ing a silk hat, and belonging by appearance to 
the class of "jolly old gentlemen." When he 
saw the boys his gold spectacles gleamed with 
kindly enjoyment. He began waving his arms 
299 



Further Foolishness 



and calling, "Now, then, boys, free shot at 
me! free shot!" In his gaiety he had, without 
noticing it, edged himself over the sidewalk 
on to the street. An express cart collided with 
him and knocked him over on his back in a 
heap of snow. He lay there gasping and try- 
ing to get the snow off his face and spectacles. 
The boys gathered up their snow-balls and took 
a run towards him. "Free shot!" they yelled. 
"Soak him! Soak him!" 

I repeat, however, that for me, as I suppose 
for most of us, it is a prime condition of 
humour that it must be without harm or mahce, 
nor should it convey even incidentally any real 
picture of sorrow or suffering or death. There 
is a great deal in the humour of Scotland (I 
admit its general merit) which seems to me, 
not being a Scotchman, to sin in this respect. 
Take this familiar story (I quote it as some- 
thing already known and not for the sake of 
telling it) . 

A Scotchman had a sister-in-law — his wife's 
sister — with whom he could never agree. He 
always objected to going anywhere with her, 
300 



Timid Thoughts on Timely Topics 

and In spite of his wife's entreaties always 
refused to do so. The wife was taken mor- 
tally ill and as she lay dying, she whispered, 
"John, ye'U drive Janet with you to the funeral, 
will ye no?" The Scotchman, after an internal 
struggle, answered, "Margaret, I'll do it for 
ye, but It'll spoil my day." 

Whatever humour there may be in this is 
lost for me by the actual and vivid picture 
that it conjures up — the dying wife, the dark- 
ened room and the last whispered request. 

No doubt the Scotch see things differently. 
That wonderful people — whom personally I 
cannot too much admire — always seem to me 
to prefer adversity to sunshine, to welcome 
the prospect of a pretty general damnation, 
and to live with grim cheerfulness within the 
very shadow of death. Alone among the na- 
tions they have converted the devil — under such 
names as Old Horny — into a familiar acquain- 
tance not without a certain grim charm of his 
own. No doubt also there enters into their 
humour something of the original barbaric at- 
titude towards things. For a primitive people 
301 



Further Foolishness 



who saw death often and at first hand, and 
for whom the future world was a vivid reality, 
that could be felt, as it were, in the midnight 
forest and heard in the roaring storm — for 
such a people it was no doubt natural to turn 
the flank of terror by forcing a merry and 
jovial acquaintance with the unseen world. Such 
a practice as a wake, and the merrymaking 
about the corpse, carry us back to the twilight 
of the world, with the poor savage in his be- 
wildered misery, pretending that his dead still 
lived. Our funeral with its black trappings 
and its elaborate ceremonies is the lineal de- 
scendant of a merrymaking. Our undertaker 
is, by evolution, a genial master of ceremonies, 
keeping things lively at the death-dance. Thus 
have the ceremonies and the trappings of death 
been transformed in the course of ages till the 
forced gaiety is gone, and the black hearse and 
the gloomy mutes betoken the cold dignity of 
our despair. 

But I fear this article is getting serious. I 
must apologise. 

I was about to say, when I wandered from 
302 



Timid Thoughts on Timely Topics 

the point, that there Is another form of humour 
which I am also quite unable to appreciate. 
This is that particular form of story which 
may be called, par excellence, the English 
Anecdote. It always deals with persons of 
rank and birth, and, except for the exalted 
nature of the subject Itself, Is, as far as I can 
see, absolutely pointless. 

This is the kind of thing that I mean. 

"His Grace the Fourth Duke of Marlbor- 
ough was noted for the openhanded hospitality 
which reigned at Blenheim, the family seat, dur- 
ing his regime. One day on going In to lunch- 
eon it was discovered that there were thirty 
guests present, whereas the table only held cov- 
ers for twenty-one. 'Oh, well,' said the Duke, 
not a whit abashed, 'some of us will have to 
eat standing up.' Everybody, of course, roared 
with laughter." 

My only wonder Is that they didn't kill 
themselves with it, A mere roar doesn't seem 
enough to do justice to such a story as this. 

The Duke of Wellington has been made the 
storm-centre of three generations of wit of this 
303 



Further Foolishness 



sort. In fact the typical Duke of Wellington 
story has been reduced to a thin skeleton such 
as this: 

"A young subaltern once met the Duke of 
Wellington coming out of Westminster Abbey. 
'Good morning, your Grace,' he said, 'rather 
a wet morning.' 'Yes,' said the Duke, with a 
very rigid bow, 'but it was a damn sight wetter, 
sir, on the morning of Waterloo.' The young 
subaltern, rightly rebuked, hung his head." 

Nor is it only the English who sin in regard 
to anecdotes. 

One can indeed make the sweeping asser- 
tion that the telling of stories as a mode of 
amusing others, ought to be kept within strict 
limits. Few people realise how extremely dif- 
ficult it is to tell a story so as to reproduce the 
real fun of it — to "get it over" as the actors 
say. The mere "facts" of a story seldom make 
it funny. It needs the right words, with every 
word in its proper place. Here and there, 
perhaps once in a hundred times a story turns 
up which needs no telling. The humour of it 
turns so completely on a sudden twist or in- 
304 



Timid Thoughts on Timely Topics 

congrulty in the denouement of it that no nar- 
rator however clumsy can altogether fumble it. 

Take, for example, this well known instance 
— a story which, in one form or other, every- 
body has heard. 

"George Grossmith, the famous comedian, 
was once badly run down and went to consult 
a doctor. It happened that the doctor, though, 
like everybody else, he had often seen Gros- 
smith on the stage, had never seen him without 
his make-up and did not know him by sight. 
He examined his patient, looked at his tongue, 
felt his pulse and tapped his lungs. Then he 
shook his head. 'There's nothing wrong with 
you, sir,' he said, 'except that you're run 
down from overwork and worry. You need 
rest and amusement. Take a night off and go 
and see George Grossmith at the Savoy.' 

" 'Thank you,' said the patient, 'I am 
George Grossmith.' " 

Let the reader please observe that I have 

purposely told this story all wrongly, just as 

wrongly as could be, and yet there is something 

left of it. Will the reader kindly look back 

30s 



Further Foolishness 



to the beginning of it and see for himself just 
how it ought to be narrated and what obvious 
error has been made. If he has any particle 
of the artist in his make-up, he will see at once 
that the story ought to begin: 

"One day a very haggard and nervous look- 
ing patient called at the office of a fashionable 
doctor, etc., etc." 

In other words, the chief point of the joke 
lies in keeping it concealed till the moment 
when the patient says, "Thank you, I am 
George Grossmith." But the story is such a 
good one that it cannot be completely spoiled 
even when told wrongly. This particular 
anecdote has been variously told of George 
Grossmith, Coquehn, Joe Jefferson, John 
Hare, Cyril Maude, and about sixty others. 
And I have noticed that there is a certain type 
of man who, on hearing this story about Gros- 
smith, immediately tells it all back again, 
putting in the name of somebody else, and goes 
into new fits of laughter over it, as if the 
change of name made it brand new. 

But few people, I repeat, realise the dif- 
306 



Timid Thoughts on Timely Topic9 

ficulty of reproducing a humorous or comic ef- 
fect in its original spirit. 

"I saw Harry Lauder last night," said 
Griggs, a Stock-Exchange friend of mine, as we 
walked up town together the other day. "He 
came onto the stage in kilts" (here Griggs 
started to chuckle) "and he had a slate under 
his arm" (here Griggs began to laugh quite 
heartily) , "and he said, 'I always like to carry 
a slate with me' (of course he said it in Scotch, 
but I can't do the Scotch the way he does it) 
'just in case there might be any figures I'd be 
wanting to put down' " (by this time Griggs 
was almost suffocated with laughter) — "and 
he took a little bit of chalk out of his pocket, 
and he said" (Griggs was now almost hysteri- 
cal), " 'I like to carry a wee bit chalk along 
because I find the slate is (Griggs was now 
faint with laughter), "'the slate is — is — not 
much good without the chalk.' " 

Griggs had to stop, with his hand to his 
side and lean against a lamp post. "I can't, of 
course, do the Scotch the way Harry Lauder 
does it," he repeated. 

307 



Further Foolishness 



Exactly. He couldn't do the Scotch and he 
couldn't do the rich mellow voice of Mr. 
Lauder and the face beaming with merriment, 
and the spectacles glittering with amusement, 
and he couldn't do the slate, nor the "wee bit 
chalk" — in fact he couldn't do any of it. He 
ought merely to have said, "Harry Lauder," 
and leaned up against a post and laughed till he 
had got over it. 

Yet in spite of everything, people insist on 
spoiling conversation by telling stories. I 
know nothing more dreadful at a dinner table 
than one of these amateur raconteurs — except 
perhaps, two of them. After about three 
stories have been told, there falls on the dinner 
table an uncomfortable silence, in which every- 
body is aware that everybody else is trying hard 
to think of another story, and is failing to 
find it. There is no peace in the gathering 
again till some man of firm and quiet mind 
turns to his neighbour and says — "But after 
all there is no doubt that whether we like it or 
not prohibition is coming." Then everybody 
in his heart says, Thank Heaven I and the whole 
308 



Timid Thoughts on Timely Topics 

tableful are happy and contented again, till one 
of the story tellers "thinks of another," and 
breaks loose. 

Worst of all perhaps is the modest story 
teller who Is haunted by the idea that one has 
heard his story before. He attacks you after 
this fashion: 

"I heard a very good story the other day 
on the steamer going to Bermuda" — then he 
pauses with a certain doubt in his face — "but 
perhaps you've heard this?" 

"No, no, I've never been to Bermuda. Go 
ahead." 

"Well, this is a story that they tell about 
a man who went down to Bermuda one winter 
to get cured of rheumatism — but you've heard 
this?" 

"No, no." 

"Well he had rheumatism pretty bad and he 
went to Bermuda to get cured of It. And so 
when he went Into the hotel he said to the 
clerk at the desk — but, perhaps you know this." 

"No, no, go right ahead." 

"Well, he said to the clerk I want a room 
309 



Further Foolishness 



that looks out over the sea — but perhaps- 



Now the sensible thing to do is to stop the 
narrator right at this point. Say to him 
quietly and firmly, "Yes, I have heard that 
story. I always liked it ever since it came out 
in Titbits in 1878, and I read it every time I 
see it. Go on and tell it to me and I'll sit back 
with my eyes closed and enjoy it." 

No doubt the story-telling habit owes much 
to the fact that ordinary people, quite uncon- 
sciously, rate humour very low: I mean, they 
underestimate the difficulty of "making hu- 
mour." It would never occur to them that the 
thing is hard, meritorious and dignified. Be- 
cause the result is gay and light, they think the 
process must be. Few people would realise 
that it is much harder to write one of Owen 
Seaman's "funny" poems in Punch than to 
write one of the Archbishop of Canterbury's 
sermons. Mark Twain's Huckleberry Finn is 
a greater work than Kant's Critique of Pure 
Reason, and Charles Dickens' creation of Mr. 
Pickwick did more for the elevation of the 
human race — I say it in all seriousness — than 
310 



Timid Thoughts on Timely Topics 

Cardinal Newman's Lead, Kindly Light, Amid 
the Encircling Gloom. Newman only cried out 
for light in the gloom of a sad world. Dickens 
gave it. 

But the deep background that lies behind 
and beyond what we call humour is revealed 
only to the few who, by instinct or by effort, 
have given thought to it. The world's humour, 
in its best and greatest sense, is perhaps the 
highest product of our civilisation. One thinks 
here not of the mere spasmodic effects of the 
comic artist or the blackface expert of the 
vaudeville show, but of the really great humour 
which, once or twice in a generation at best, 
illuminates and elevates our literature. It is 
no longer dependent upon the mere trick and 
quibble of words, or the' odd and meaningless 
incongruities in things that strike us as "funny." 
Its basis lies in the deeper contrasts offered by 
life itself: the strange incongruity between our 
aspiration and our achievement, the eager and 
fretful anxieties of to-day that fade into noth- 
ingness to-morrow, the burning pain and the 
sharp sorrow that are softened in the gentle 
311 



Further Foolishness 



retrospect of time, till as we look back upon 
the course that has been traversed we pass in 
view the panorama of our lives, as peopl - ^ 
old age may recall, with mingled tears ; i 
smiles, the angry quarrels of their childho. d. 
And here. In its larger aspect, humour is 
blended with pathos till the two are one, and 
represent, as they have in every age, the min- 
gled heritage of tears and laughter that i*- ur 
lot on earth. 






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